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ITALIAI  SIGHTS 


AND 

PAPAL  PEINCIPLES, 


SEKN  THROUGH 

AMERICAN  SPECTACLES. 

A. 


JAMES  JACKSON  JARVES, 

AUTHOR  OF  “ART-HINTS,”  “PARISIAN  SIGHTS,”  &c.,  &e. 


NEW  YORK 

HARPER  &  BROTHERS,  PUBLISHERS, 

PEARL  STREET,  FRANKLIN  SQUARE. 

1  856. 


Entered,  according  to  Act  of  Congress,  in  the  year  one  thou¬ 
sand  eight  hundred  and  fifty-five,  by 

HARPER  &  BROTHERS, 

In  the  Clerk’s  Office  for  the  Southern  District  of  New  York. 


PREFACE. 


“  Simul  et  jucunda  et  idonea  dicere  vitae.” 

Some  of  these  “  Sights”  were  penned  several  years  back, 
while  others  are  but  of  yesterday,  I  refer  you,  dear  reader, 
for  farther  insight,  to  the  chapters  themselves.  Hoping 
that,  while  you  find  amusement  in  the  “  Sights,”  you  will 
not  fail  to  “read,  mark,  learn,  and  inwardly  digest”  the 
Principles,  I  remain. 

Your  obliged  servant 

Ever  at  command, 

The  Author. 


•  V,- 


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ITALIAN  SIGHTS 


AND 

PAPAL  PRINCIPLES. 


CHAPTER  I. 

INTRODUCTION  TO  ITALY - GENOA - HOW  MUCH  TEMPER  AND 

MONEY  IT  COST  TO  GET  TO  FLORENCE. 

Superb  Genoa,  shall  I  ever  forget  thee  ?  thyself  hut  one 
of  a  series  of  beautiful  entrances  to  a  land  favored  of  God  and 
cursed  of  rulers !  By  thy  gates  I  first  entered  Italy.  What 
other  country  can  boast  such  magnificent  portals  ?  Naples, 
Genoa,  Venice,  and  the  Alps,  announce  thy  treasures  on  the 
very  threshold  of  thy  domains.  By  whichsoever  side  thou  art 
approached,  thou  welcomest  son  and  stranger  to  a  plentiful  n 
feast  provided  by  nature  and  spread  by  art. 

Genoa  the  Superb  !  and  superb  she  is  ;  more  beautiful  even 
now,  when  her  power  has  departed,  than  when  to  be  a  doge 
was  to  be  more  than  king.  The  child  of  commerce  has  not 
been  forsaken  in  old  age,  because  she  has  not  despised  the 
hand  that  in  her  youth  fashioned  her  to  wealth  and  glory. 

I  like  Genoa.  I  like  it  the  more  from  its  contrast  with  Mar¬ 
seilles.  True,  it  has  but  few  streets,  but  they  are  streets  of 
palaces.  Its  other  avenues  are  more  like  subterranean  pas¬ 
sages  than  streets,  for  the  houses  are  so  lofty  that  only  a  ver- 

A  2 


10 


ITALIAN  SIGHTS  AND  PAPAL  PRINCIPLES. 


tical  sun  can  light  their  depths.  Even  this  is  in  general  shut 
out  by  projecting  eaves  that  almost  meet.  Then  they  are  so 
irregular  as  to  defy  all  calculation  on  the  part  of  a  stranger 
who  ventures  to  explore  their  intricacies.  He  doubles  on  his 
own  track,  and  thinks  himself  going  east,  when  his  face  is  to¬ 
ward  the  setting  sun.  Then,  too,  he  finds  streets  far  above 
him ;  others  below ;  some  terminated  abruptly  by  a  rock  ; 
while  many  look  as  if  they  were  about  to  leap  into  the  sea. 
At  one  moment  carriages  are  rolling  along,  a  hundred  feet 
over  his  head,  on  bridges  which  spring  from  one  precipice  to 
another.  The  next  instant  he  stands  at  the  base  of  a  lofty 
palace,  and  yet  finds  himself  looking  into  the  chimneys  of  sev¬ 
en-story  houses  beneath.  One  edifice  begins  at  an  elevation 
where  another  terminates,  and  thus  they  rise,  layer  upon  layer 
of  buildings,  far  up  the  precipitous  hills,  down  their  sides,  in 
their  crevices,  spanning  their  chasms,  clinging  to  the  rocks 
like  shell-fish,  or  growing  like  moss  wherever  a  foundation 
can  be  had.  In  many  places  the  streets  are  walled  in  to  pre¬ 
vent  wayfarers  from  falling  off.  If  you  wish  to  arrive  quick¬ 
ly  at  any  spot,  you  must  walk.  Comparatively  few  streets 
are  accessible  to  carriages,  which  makes  Genoa  the  paradise 
of  pedestrians.  At  one  angle  opens  a  most  charming  sea- 
view —  the  surf  foams  at  your  feet — if  perfectly  clear,  the 
mountains  of  Corsica  can  be  seen.  At  another  are  disclosed 
the  forests  of  masts  in  the  harbor,  with  a  fleet  of  white  sails 
studding  the  horizon,  and  an  occasional  steamer’s  pipe  leav¬ 
ing  behind  it  a  comet-like  tail  of  black  smoke.  Turn,  and 
you  see  terraced  gardens,  fountains,  statuary,  bright  flowers, 
and  perhaps  smiling  faces  from  latticed  windows  looking 
down  upon  you.  Farther  back  rise  villas  and  vineyards  upon 
the  sunny  hill-sides.  Their  summits  are  crested  with  a  dark 
array  of  forts  and  bristling  ramparts,  standing  out  in  strong 
relief  against  the  clear  sky.  Genoa  is  a  perpetual  ascent 


ITALIAN  SIGHTS  AND  PAPAL  PRINCIPLES. 


1 1 


or  descent,  but  each  pace  brings  with  it  something  worth 
seeing. 

I  breakfasted  at  a  cafe,  amid  an  orange  grove,  loaded  at  the 
same  time  with  the  ripe  fruit,  bud,  and  blossom.  At  home  it 
had  already  snowed  in  a  latitude  to  the  south  of  this. 

Passing  through  the  Strada  Balbi,  absorbed  in  admiration  of 
the  exterior  of  the  noble  palaces  built  by  merchant  princes, 
and  recognizing  in  them  not  only  a  taste,  but  a  humanity  vast¬ 
ly  superior  to  the  castles  of  feudalism  which  had  so  recently 
attracted  my  attention  on  the  Rhone,  I  was  accosted  by  a 
rusty-looking  individual,  who,  for  the  small  consideration  of 
three  francs,  proposed  to  introduce  me  into  their  interiors,  and 
pilot  me  to  all  other  lions  of  Genoa.  He  looked,  withal,  as 
honest  as  he  was  poor,  so  I  told  him  to  be  on  hand  at  an  early 
hour  the  next  morning.  In  the  mean  while,  as  there  was  some 
daylight  left,  he  might  commence  operations  with  the  most  dis¬ 
tinguished  of  the  ecclesiastical  museums,  by  the  taste  of  man, 
rather  than  by  the  will  of  God,  called  churches. 

On  entering  the  Holy  Annunciation,  second  in  size  only  to 
the  Cathedral,  my  eyes  were  fairly  dazzled  with  the  blaze  of 
gold  from  the  ceilings,  and  the  rich  colorings  of  the  frescoes. 
This  is,  indeed,  a  magnificent  temple,  and  as  completely  out¬ 
shines  the  Madeleine  at  Paris  in  richness  of  ornament  as  it  ex¬ 
cels  it  in  correct  taste.  The  sumptuary  laws  of  republican 
Genoa  forbade  its  trading  Croesuses  to  expend  their  wealth  in 
personal  prodigalities.  Being  thus  deprived  of  the  more  vul¬ 
gar  mode  of  display,  they  competed  with  each  other  in  the 
erection  of  churches,  each  distinguished  family  building  for  it¬ 
self  a  temple  of  its  own.  Thus  the  “  Annunziata”  is  the  mon¬ 
ument  of  the  wealth,  and,  if  you  will,  the  piety  of  the  Lomel- 
lini  family.  It  was  built  two  centuries  since,  and  gives  one  a 
strong  idea  of  the  comfortable  position  of  a  family  which  could 
afford,  after  having  reared  a  sumptuous  palace  to  itself,  to  in- 


12 


ITALIAN  SIGHTS  AND  PAPAL  PRINCIPLES. 


vest  its  superfluous  millions  in  a  house  of  God,  and  keep  up  a 
befitting  state  for  both. 

The  Carignan  bridge,  one  of  those  that  cross  streets  and 
not  a  river,  uniting  two  mountains  and  passing  over  very  lofty 
houses,  was  the  work  of  the  family  Sauli,  and  leads  directly  to 
the  church  of  Sainte  Marie  de  Carignan,  built  also  by  them. 
Its  origin  was  in  this  wise.  The  Marquis  Sauli  was  the  owner 
of  several  palaces,  one  of  which  occupied  the  site  of  the  pres¬ 
ent  church  ;  but  as  he  possessed  no  chapel  of  his  own,  he  often 
went  to  mass  in  a  church  that  belonged  to  his  neighbor  Fiesque. 
One  day,  finding  himself  too  late,  he  laughingly  complained  to 
his  noble  friend  of  his  disappointment. 

“  My  dear  Marquis,”  replied  Fiesque,  who  had  designedly 
anticipated  the  hour  of  worship  to  give  force  to  his  hint,  “  when 
one  goes  to  mass,  he  should  have  a  chapel  of  his  own.” 

Sauli  took  the  hint  in  good  part,  demolished  a  palace,  and 
built  on  its  foundation  a  church  which  cost  enough  to  have 
satisfied  even  Solomon. 

St.  Laurent,  the  cathedral,  pleased  me  greatly.  The  Sara¬ 
cens  evidently  had  had  something  to  say  in  its  construction, 
for  the  Moorish  and  Christian  styles  of  architecture  are  singu¬ 
larly  blended  in  its  interior.  Like  all  the  others,  it  is  a  mu¬ 
seum,  and  the  visitor  is  irreverently  conducted  by  its  officials 
for  a  small  fee  through  all  its  sacred  precincts,  and  unceremo¬ 
niously  invited  to  examine  any  thing  curious  without  scruple, 
whatever  may  be  its  claims  to  sanctity,  This  system  of  mak¬ 
ing  a  mercenary  show  of  the  gifts  of  the  altar,  which  prevails 
in  all  Catholic  countries,  struck  me  as  peculiarly  destructive 
of  the  respect  due  the  temples  of  the  Most  High.  One  in¬ 
sensibly  forgets  their  holy  purposes  in  admiration  of  the  works 
of  man,  or  in  irreverent  ridicule  at  the  absurd  claims  of  false 
relics.  Frequently  the  extravagant  execution  of  some  saintly 
picture  or  work  of  art  is  such  as  only  to  excite  laughter.  I  saw 


ITALIAN  SIGHTS  AND  PAPAL  PRINCIPLES. 


13 


a  Madonna — not,  however,  in  this  church  —  holding  in  her 
hands,  as  a  mother  holds  a  babe  when  it  first  begins  to  know 
the  pleasure  of  exercising  its  limbs,  a  naked  adult  Christ,  of 

the  proportion  to  her  of  a  small  doll,  with  the  shrunken  mus- 

* 

cles,  bowed  head,  and  rigid  attitude  given  in  the  Descents  from 
the  Cross.  The  Virgin  had  the  appearance  of  holding  him  up 
to  take  a  dance  on  her  knees.  My  clerical  cicerone  pointed 
me  out  a  portrait  of  Mary,  painted  by  St.  Luke.  The  apostle 
appears  to  have  worked  diligently  in  this  line,  if  we  can  be¬ 
lieve  the  claims  of  all  the  churches  that  possess  original  paint¬ 
ings  of  the  mother  of  Christ.  “  Do  you  really  think  St.  Luke 
did  this  one  ?”  I  asked  He  shrugged  his  shoulders,  half  smiled, 
and  called  my  attention  to  something  more  modern. 

The  side  chapel  of  St.  John  the  Baptist  possesses  the  mortal 
remains — so  they  say — of  the  victim  of  Herodias  ;  but  as  I  ex¬ 
pected,  before  my  travels  in  the  region  of  relics  were  termin¬ 
ated,  to  meet  with  a  duplicate  set,  1  only  left  half  of  my  faith 
at  this  shrine.  This  is  very  rich  and  beautiful.  A  service 
was  being  performed  in  it  for  the  soul  of  a  criminal  to  be  exe¬ 
cuted  on  the  morrow.  On  account  of  the  agency  of  woman  in 
the  death  of  the  prophet  of  the  wilderness,  her  sex  are  allowed 
to  enter  this  chapel  but  once  a  year — not  much  of  an  inter¬ 
diction,  as  it  is  perfectly  open  to  the  eye.  Besides,  if  woman 
wished,  it  was  man  that  performed  the  crime. 

St.  Laurent  contains  also  the  famous  emerald  dish  given  by 
the  Glueen  of  Sheba  to  King  Solomon,  and  afterward  preserved 
in  the  Temple.  How  it  escaped  the  prying  eyes  of  the  ran¬ 
sacking  lieutenants  of  Nebuchadnezzar  the  monks  do  not  ex¬ 
plain,  but  assert  that  from  it  Christ  ate  the  Last  Supper.  It 
was  found  among  the  spoils  of  Caesarea,  upon  the  capture  of 
that  town  by  the  combined  armies  of  Genoa  and  Pisa  in  1101. 
At  that  date,  the  Genoese,  possessing  more  faith  than  avarice, 
took  the  “  Sacro  Cattino”  for  their  share  of  the  booty,  leaving 


14 


ITALIAN  SIGHTS  AND  PAPAL  PRINCIPLES. 


to  the  Pisans  in  exchange  the  entire  mass  of  filthy  lucre.  It 
was  brought  to  Genoa,  where  it  continued  to  be  held  in  such 
veneration  that  twelve  nobles  were  appointed  to  guard  it,  or, 
rather,  the  tabernacle  which  contained  it,  each  a  month  in 
turn.  It  was  exhibited  but  once  a  year  to  the  adoration  of 
the  crowd.  Then  a  priest  held  it  aloft  by  a  cord,  while  its 
twelve  guardians  formed  a  circle  around.  In  1476  a  law  was 
enacted  condemning  to  death  whoever  touched  the  holy  em¬ 
erald  with  any  substance  whatever.  Unless  the  booty  at  Cae¬ 
sarea  was  very  large,  the  Genoese  did  not  make  a  bad  invest¬ 
ment  in  their  emerald,  for  within  fifty  years  the  Jews  lent 
them  four  millions  of  francs  on  its  security.  In  1809,  among 
the  other  valuables  borrowed  of  Italy  by  Napoleon,  it  traveled 
to  Paris,  where  it  remained  until  1815,  when  it  was  restored 
without  difficulty,  broken,  and  ascertained  to  be  glass — an  an¬ 
cient  specimen,  undoubtedly,  but  worth  something  under  eight 
hundred  thousand  dollars.  It  is  still  preserved  on  account  of 
its  souvenirs,  and  as  a  curious  glass  dish ;  but  Genoa  has  lost, 
in  losing  her  belief  in  the  relic,  a  capital  of  nearly  a  million 
of  dollars. 

Faith  in  Catholic  relics  is  essentially  the  substance  of  things 
unseen,  for,  when  seen,  faith  vanishes. 

St.  Laurent  possesses  a  rare  merit  for  an  Italian  church.  It 
is  finished,  although  not  quite  seven  hundred  years  old. 

Enough  of  churches.  My  old  friend  was  prompt  to  his  en¬ 
gagement  for  the  next  morning.  We  passed  from  one  palace 
to  another  with  all  the  freedom  of  ownership,  by  the  aid  of  a 
trifling  fee  bestowed  upon  their  guardians.  The  liberality  of 
the  Italians  in  throwing  open  their  collections  to  the  entire 
world  is  worthy  of  praise  and  imitation  elsewhere.  It  is  done 
so  unostentatiously  that  one  feels  at  home  within  their  halls. 
Great  as  were  the  masters  that  I  passed  in  review — Genoa  is 
rich  in  paintings — I  felt  still  more  interest  in  the  various 


ITALIAN  SIGHTS  AND  PAPAL  PRINCIPLES. 


15 


princely  residences  commerce  had  bestowed  upon  her  suc¬ 
cessful  sons.  Her  prizes  were  few,  but  they  were  worth 
drawing.  There  was  the  old  Dueal  Palace — the  least  pleas¬ 
ing,  but  grandest  of  them  all — coldly  aristocratic,  like  the  gov¬ 
ernment  it  represented  ;  then  that  of  Andrew  Doria,  with  its 
charming  garden,  offering  to  the  port  as  fine  a  view  as  it  gives 
from  its  own  unrivaled  marble  terrace.  It  was  upon  this  ter¬ 
race  that  the  old  admiral  gave  his  famous  repasts  to  embassa¬ 
dors,  served  in  silver  vessels  which  were  renewed  three  times. 
At  every  change ’of  course,  the  vessels  were  thrown  into  the 
sea.  Fine  fishing  in  those  days,  but  I  suspect  the  humbug¬ 
ging  host  reserved  that  right  to  himself ;  for,  notwithstanding 
his  frequent  banquets,  no  shoal  of  silver  ever  made  its  appear¬ 
ance  under  his  windows.  Strozzi,  at  Florence,  for  want  of  a 
more  refined  method  of  exhibiting  his  wealth,  used  to  seat  his 
guests  upon  bags  of  dollars.  It  is  to  be  hoped  that  they  were 
cushioned. 

The  Durazzo  Palace,  oecupied  by  the  king  on  his  visits  to 
Genoa,  is  a  fine  speeimen  of  a  comfortable  regal  residence,  not 
so  grand  as  to  be  cold,  nor  so  homely  as  to  be  unroyal.  To 
facilitate  the  passage  of  their  majesties  from  one  story  to  an¬ 
other — in  other  words,  to  save  stair-work — a  sort  of  dumb¬ 
waiter  boudoir  has  .been  contrived,  into  which  they  have  sim¬ 
ply  to  place  themselves  to  be  landed  at  any  elevation  they 
desire  in  their  mansion.  It  is  lined  with  yellow  satin,  and 
looks  very  safe  and  comfortable. 

The  Brignole  Palace  contains  a  galaxy  of  distinguished 
names.  Titian,  Paul  Veronese,  Paris  Bordone,  Louis  Caracchi, 
Carlo  Dolci,  Guercino,  Guido,  and  particularly  Vandyck,  have 
contributed  liberally  to  adorn  its  walls.  But  the  palace  that 
pleased  me  most — it  contained  the  fewest  pictures — was  the 
Balbi.  It  is  the  home  of  the  most  beautiful  woman  of  Genoa. 
The  exquisite  bust  of  the  Countess,  which  the  guardian  as- 


IG 


ITALIAN  SIGHTS  AND  PAPAL  PRINCIPLES. 


serted  did  not  do  her  justice — she  must  be  ravishingly  beau¬ 
tiful  ! — was  in  the  principal  salon.  It  was  more  like  one  of 
Power’s  inimitable  heads  of  Proserpine  than  the  bust  of  a  real 
mother.  Her  children,  in  stone,  were  no  less  beautiful,  and, 
as  report  said  the  truth  had  not  been  exaggerated,  it  was  a 
laudable  vanity  to  perpetuate  the  memory  of  so  rare  an  assem¬ 
blage  of  loveliness.  We  were  taken  into  the  boudoir  and  bed¬ 
rooms,  both  displaying  the  taste  of  a  cultivated  woman ;  ele¬ 
gance  and  comfort  so  combined  as  to  extort  at  first  glance, 
from  every  visitor,  an  exclamation  of  eiiVious  admiration. 
Surely  it  is  no  wrong  to  wish  for  such  a  home.  There  were 
indications,  too,  that  the  Countess  made  it  also  the  house  of 
prayer.  With  the  crucifix  at  the  head  of  her  bed  hung  a 
touching  memorial  of  a  lost  child — a  double  remembrance  of 
her  hopes  in  heaven. 

I  will  not  compel  my  readers  to  ascend  and  descend  as 
many  steps,  and  to  explore  as  many  streets  as  I  did  with  my 
venerable  guide,  for  fear  that  they  might  do  what  he  would 
never  have  done — drop  me — at  least,  without  his  pay.  At  last 
I  sought  the  “  Arsenal  of  the  Holy  Ghost” — forgive  me  the  in¬ 
congruity  of  the  name,  for  it  is  none  of  my  making — to  seek 
the  famous  rostrum  of  an  ancient  vessel  found  long  since  in 
the  port  of  Genoa.  It  was  supposed  to  be  the  beak  of  one  of 
the  galleys  of  Magon,  brother  of  Hannibal,  and  broken  off  in 
a  naval  combat  in  this  harbor  in  the  year  524  of  Rome.  No 
one  was  allowed  to  enter  the  Arsenal  without  a  permit.  The 
sentinel,  in  deference  to  my  antiquarian  zeal,  and  my  assur¬ 
ance  that  I  would  overlook  all  modern  engines  of  war,  let  me 
pass.  An  officer,  however,  soon  informed  me  that  the  “  ros¬ 
trum”  had  traveled  to  Turin.  It  should  have  been  set  up  as 
a  monument  to  Jason  on  some  conspicuous  classical  promon¬ 
tory. 

T  had  pretty  well  done  up  Genoa — at  all  events,  its  crust. 


ITALIAN  SIGHTS  AND  PAPAL  PRINCIPLES. 


17 


My  guide  was  done  up  too.  He  had  asked  but  three  francs — 
I  gave  him  four.  In  return,  he  said  he  should  pray  for  my 
illustrious  self  every  day  of  his  life.  As  he  was  a  good  man, 
I  was  not  sorry  to  hear  this,  but  as  he  turned  to  go,  doubts 
arose  in  my  mind  as  to  whether  I  should  long  have  the  bene¬ 
fit  of  them. 

Many  hard  sayings  are  current  of  Genoa.  Louis  XI.  said 
of  its  citizens,  “  The  Genoese  have  given  themselves  to  me, 
and  I  give  them  to  the  devil.”  They  might  have  retorted  that 
it  was  unnecessary,  as  in  doing  the  former  they  had  accom¬ 
plished  the  latter.  As  for  myself,  I  found  every  thing  good  at 
Genoa ;  I  was  satisfied  with  my  hotel,  my  guide,  table  prices, 
and  visit  altogether,  even  to  their  Bedouins  of  the  water,  the 
boatmen.  And  yet  the  proverb — it  must  have  come  from  the 
Pisans — runs  to  this  day,  “Mare  senza  pesci,monti  senza  ligno, 
uomini  senza  fede,  donna  senza  vergogna which  signifies, 
“  Sea  without  fish,  mountains  without  wood,  men  without  faith, 
women  without  shame.”  If  other  Italian  cities  possess  clean¬ 
er  skirts  than  Genoa,  I  am  yet  to  learn  it. 

Reader  mine,  did  you  ever  read  the  advertisement  of  a  Med¬ 
iterranean  steam-boat?  There  are  numerous  lines  diverging 
from  Marseilles  east,  west,  and  south,  along  the  neighboring 
coasts,  sailing  under  the  French,  Sardinian,  Spanish,  or  Nea¬ 
politan  flags,  but  they  all  sing  the  same  song — sumptuous  ac¬ 
commodations,  spacious  family  saloons,  an  epicurean  table, 
prompt  dispatch,  and  great  speed.  Such  is  the  burden  of 
their  chant.  One  may  fairly  be  pardoned  for  indulging  in  the 
presumption  that  they  are  about  to  go  on  board  of  a  craft  that 
could  claim  a  place,  at  all  events,  in  one  of  our  coasting  lines 
of  sea-steamers.  But  it  is  all  a  crafty  snare.  Lest  you,  my 
reader,  should  be  deluded  by  the  many  adjectives  of  a  steam¬ 
er  placard  while  on  your  classical  tour,  I  will  give  you  a  char¬ 
itable  forewarning  of  what  you  may  expect. 


18 


ITALIAN  SIGHTS  AND  PAPAL  PRINCIPLES. 


^ - - - - - - 

You  say,  Why  not  go  on  board,  and  test  for  yourself  the  de¬ 
scription  ?  Exactly  because  5’'ou  can  not.  If  you  are  able  to 
distinguish  in  the  distance  your  own  smoke-pipe  from  the 
grove  of  others,  you  are  lucky.  The  nearest  you  can  get  to  it 
is  a  sight  of  a  lithographic  sketch  in  the  agent’s  office  of  the 
accommodations,  made,  of  course,  to  correspond  with  the  ad¬ 
vertisement.  Indeed,  an  American  is  so  accustomed  to  be¬ 
lieve  that  a  steam-packet  is  a  steam-packet,  that  it  does  not 
occur  to  him  to  verify  the  description  with  the  reality.  He 
selects  his  place,  pays  two  dollars  where  he  would  pay  one  in 
the  United  States,  and  thinks  the  affair  settled.  Not  so. 
There  is  another  charge  for  putting  you  on  board,  and  a  heavy 
one  too  ;  another  for  a  health  certificate,  ditto  for  police  ;  then 
you  are  told  that  you  must  pay  two  dollars  to  the  American 
consul,  and  a  sliding  scale  of  from  fifty  cents  to  a  dollar  each 
to  each  one  of  the  consuls  of  the  several  countries  the  steam¬ 
er  touches  at.  If  you  wish  to  land,  you  are  compelled  to  do 
this,  for  although  they  often  remain  from  one  to  several  days 
in  a  port,  they  furnish  no  food  on  board  during  that  time,  not¬ 
withstanding  the  original  fare  terminated  with  a  round  sum 
per  day  charged  for  meals.  In  leaving  Marseilles,  it  cost  me 
nearly  eight  dollars  to  get  on  board  the  steam-boat,  one  quarter 
of  which  the  American  consul,  whom  1  never  saw,  pocketed. 
He  levies  this  tax  upon  his  countrymen  by  an  understanding 
with  the  officials  of  other  powers  that  they  are  not  to  visd 
passports  that  have  not  his  signature. 

See  us,  then,  alongside  of  the  steamer,  punctual  to  the  hour 
of  departure.  Our  first  surprise  was  at  her  dimensions,  which 
would  have  entitled  her  to  the  place  of  a  launch  in  compari¬ 
son  with  an  Atlantic  boat.  It  was  the  Castore,  of  Genoa,  one 
of  the  best  of  the  Sardinian  line,  newly  refitted  and  in  fine  or¬ 
der.  For  a  gentleman’s  yacht  her  size  would  have  been  un¬ 
exceptionable,  although  above  the  water-line  she  was  too 


ITALIAN  SIGHTS  AND  PAPAL  PRINCIPLES. 


19 


lightly  built  for  the  stormy  Gulf  of  Lyons.  The  baggage  was 
piled  up  on  deck,  and  a  tarpaulin  lashed  over  it,  but  not  so 
thoroughly  but  that  some  of  the  trunks  were  exposed  to  a 
heavy  rain.  The  whole  mass  would  have  gone  a  voyaging  on 
its  own  account  had  even  a  moderate-sized  sea  come  on  board. 
Some  hours  after  the  time  appointed  we  steamed  'out  of  port, 
distressingly  surcharged  with  passengers. 

The  spacious  family  saloons  were  the  frailest  and  most  di¬ 
minutive  of  state-rooms,  alongside  of  the  paddle-boxes,  in  dan¬ 
gerous  proximity  to  the  sea.  The  boat  was  very  low  in  the 
water,  and  fitted  up  with  berths  after  the  fashion  of  the  old 
steerage  arrangements  of  the  California  steamers  ;  that  is  to 
say,  eight  persons  to  occupy  the  room  of  two,  and  to  pay  the 
passage  of  sixteen.  Below,  the  economy  of  space  was  still 
greater.  The  division  was  the  reverse  of  that  of  our  packet 
schooners.  Two  state-rooms  for  ladies  were  forward,  and  the 
cabin  for  gentlemen  aft.  In  the  former  were  crowded  ladies, 
nurses,  and  children,  in  one  promiscuous  pile,  so  thickly  brought 
together  that  the  atmospheric  air  had  no  room  to  enter,  or  en¬ 
tered  only  to  leave  in  disgust.  In  the  latter  the  pressure  was 
equally  great.  The  berths  were  merely  open  shelves,  of  not 
the  width  of  the  shoulders  of  an  ordinary  sized  man,  and  with 
no  support  to  prevent  one  from  imitating  the  motion  of  the 
ship,  and  rolling  upon  a  neighbor  stretched  at  full  length  upon 
a  cushioned  bench  beneath.  Floor  and  table  had  also  their 
living  freight,  but  this  was  after  what  was  dearly  paid  for  as 
a  dinner  had  been  served.  The  passengers  are  required  to 
pay  a  price  for  meals,  whether  they  partake  or  not,  which 
would  entitle  them  in  Paris  to  a  seat  at  the  table  d’hote  at  the 
Hotel  des  Princes.  The  hours  for  eating  are  ingeniously  con¬ 
trived  to  fall  upon  that  period  when  there  is  most  motion  and 
no  one  can  come  to  the  table,  or  else  the  steward  hurries  off 
the  few  cold  dishes  on  the  plea  that,  as  there  is  no  rack,  his 


20 


ITALIAN  SIGHTS  AND  PAPAL  PRINCIPLES. 


crockery  will  be  broken.  I  had  come  on  board  at  the  hour  no¬ 
tified  for  sailing,  too  early  to  dine  on  shore,  expecting  to  eat 
the  meal,  for  which  I  had  paid,  on  board.  It  was  not  served 
until  after  eight  o’clock  ;  I  had  breakfasted  at  nine,  and,  being 
an  old  sailor,  felt  disposed  to  assert  my  masticatory  rights.  In 
this  I  was  joined  by  a  young  English  lady,  to  whose  appetite 
the  sea  had  no  terrors.  By  this  time  the  boat  was  polkaing 
her  way  through  the  waters  right  merrily.  Equilibrium  was 
at  a  discount,  and  appetites  in  general  as  if  they  had  never 
been.  To  nineteen  twentieths  of  the  passengers  food  was 
about  as  welcome  as  water  to  a  mad  dog,  although  an  hour 
previous  they  had  been  mutinous  with  hunger.  But  the  stew¬ 
ard-contractor  knew  his  game,  and  could  calculate  to  a  minute 
where  for  one  dinner  eaten  he  could  save  twenty.  The  berths 
were  full  of  groaning  victims  of  Neptune.  We  must  eat  in 
their  midst,  or  not  eat  at  all.  The  lady  and  myself  were  de¬ 
termined  neither  to  be  sea-sick  nor  to  lose  our  dinners.  A  few 
attempted  to  follow  our  example,  but  one  by  one  they  came 
and  went  like  ghosts,  until  we  were  left  alone.  The  steward 
grew  wroth  at  our  pertinacity.  We  ate  slowly,  calling  for  all 
we  could  get — small  matter  that — to  enjoy  his  vexation,  ever 
and  anon  hinting  that  it  was  a  shabby  meal  for  so  extravagant 
a  price,  and  of  course  that  he  must  have  some  gustatory  sur¬ 
prise  in  store  for  us.  He  was  a  stout,  surly  Italian,  a  devout 
disciple  of  Mammon,  and  he  watched  every  mouthful  of  dis¬ 
appearing  chicken  with  all  the  eagerness  of  a  hungry  cat, 
dancing  about,  in  the  mean  while,  like  a  jumping  Jack,  to 
catch  the  falling  dishes.  In  his  anxiety  for  his  beloved  crock¬ 
ery,  he  would  not  have  left  me  even  a  plate,  had  I  not  decid¬ 
edly  insisted  upon  the  article,  and  something  on  it.  He  even 
had  the  impudence  to  insinuate  that  I  was  eating  enough  for 
two.  I  retorted  that  that  was  not  surprising,  as  I  paid  for  four. 
My  lady  friend  was  as  agreeable  as  she  was  sea-proof — a  pol- 


ITALIAN  SIGHTS  AND  PAPAL  PRINCIPLES. 


21 


yglot  in  the  most  charming  of  bindings  ;  so  we  made  merry  in 
English,  French,  or  Italian  alternately,  as  we  charitably  con¬ 
cluded  we  could  most  aggravate  our  penurious  old  purveyor. 
But  he  soon  had  his  revenge.  Distant  sea-sickness  we  were 
fortified  against,  but  the  commotion  of  stomachs  grew  nearer 
and  louder.  At  last  an  old  gentleman  immediately  opposite, 
to  whom,  I  doubt  not,  the  smell  of  our  viands  had  been  a  most 
unsavory  incense,  turned  suddenly  over,  drew  from  his  berth 
a  nameless  vessel,  placed  it  within  a  few  feet  of  our  faces,  and 
with  a  rushing,  roaring  noise,  avenged  his  wrongs  and  the  dys¬ 
pepsia  of  fifty  dinners  at  once.  My  fair  friend  had  detected 
the  coming  storm  sooner  than  I,  and,  by  the  time  the  liquid 
apparition  had  fairly  appeared,  was  on  deck.  I  saw  only  the 
gleam  of  her  skirt  as  she  turned  the  hatchway.  Grasping 
blindly  at  the  nearest  edible,  I  rushed  in  pursuit.  The  remain¬ 
der  of  the  evening  we  devoted  to  admiration  of  the  sublimity 
of  a  classical  storm  at  the  base  of  the  moonlit  mountains  of 
the  Italian  shore,  venturing  no  allusion  to  our  inglorious  re¬ 
treat. 

The  steward  was  now  complete  master  of  the  field.  Man, 
woman,  and  child  were  at  his  mercy,  and  neither  he  nor  his 
myrmidons  would  stir  to  their  assistance  without  a  fee.  I  re¬ 
monstrated  with  him,  not  on  my  own  account,  for  his  covet¬ 
ousness,  after  the  high  price  paid.  “  That  entitles  you  only 
to  a  passage ;  we  are  not  obliged  to  give  you  even  a  glass  of 
water,”  was  the  reply,  worthy  of  a  Midas.  A  nice  speculation 
he  made  of  the  wants  of  the  helpless  sea-sick.  Every  morsel 
to  eat,  every  lemon  to  wet  the  lips,  each  cup  of  tea  or  coffee, 
or  drop  of  brandy  and  water,  brought  him  a  Californian  profit. 
Dumas  says,  in  this  same  passage  of  ten  hours  he  swallowed 
twenty-eight  francs’  worth  of  tea.  It  would  have  cost  Dr. 
Johnson  a  fortune.  Dismal  were  the  groans  and  cries  from 
the  ladies’  cabin  as  the  night  bore  on.  The  boat  behaved  very 


22 


ITALIAN  SIGHTS  AND  PAPAL  PRINCIPLES. 


well  after  the  fashion  of  a  sea-dog,  but  very  badly  in  the  ex¬ 
cited  imaginations  of  the  sea-sick.  Rip — rip,  thump — thump, 
would  go  a  sea  upon  her  side,  canting  her  over  until  those  on 
the  floor  fancied  they  were  transported  to  the  ceiling  ;  the  en¬ 
gines  meanwhile  straining  and  tugging  to  pull  her  along,  now 
jumping,  now  plunging,  the  boat  creaking  in  every  joint  of  her 
frame,  until  she  became  one  chaos  of  sounds  and  struggles,  and 
the  ladies  frantic  with  fright.  “  Steward !  oh,  steward  !  the 
bowl,  quick!”  “Coming,  marm — all  in  use — in  a  minute.” 
“Tell  me,  is  there  danger?”  “  Not  at  all ;  we  are  getting  on 
finely.”  Another  roll  and  general  capsize  of  persons  and  liq¬ 
uids,  enlivened  by  the  sound  as  if  of  timbers  twisting  off,  or 
a  rock  of  a  ton  weight  had  hit  her  side.  “  Mercy  on  us,  we 
shall  sink — I  am  sure  the  boat  will  break  in  pieces — what 
shall  we  do?”  A  dozen  calls  for  the  unfortunate  steward  at 
once,  for  vessels,  tea,  and  consolation.  In  his  distraction,  he 
hands  the  wrong  article  to  each.  At  this  juncture  a  heavy 
fall,  struggle,  and  naughty  exclamation  in  the  gentlemen’s 
cabin.  Some  one  has  been  pitched  from  an  upper  berth  on  to 
the  table,  and  thence  on  to  his  lower  neighbor’s  abdomen.  No 
one  pities  sea-sick  men ;  they  are  at  once  the  most  helpless 
and  the  most  disgusting  of  objects  ;  all  poke  fun  at  them  :  a 
faint  laugh,  fresh  gurgle,  and  all  have  relapsed  into  their  pre¬ 
vious  condition  of  unutterable  misery,  the  most  despairing 
wishing  that  some  Samaritan  might  be  found  to  throw  them 
overboard.  For  a  few  minutes  there  is  a  lull  inside  and  out, 
but  the  rain  soon  descends  afresh,  the  wind  howls  still  more 
frightfully,  the  boat  squirms  like  an  impaled  centipede,  and 
the  ladies  wax  more  desperate  than  ever.  “  Do  you  call  this 
a  steam-boat?”  at  last  exclaims  one  imperfectly,  furious  in  her 
terror  and  sickness  ;  “  we  would  not  go  down  the  harbor  in  it 
at  home.  I  hope  it  will  sink  as  soon  as  we  are  all  out  of  it.” 
The  steward  looked  aghast.  He  worshiped  the  boat,  for  it 


ITALIAN  SIGHTS  AND  PAPAL  PRINCIPLES. 


S3 


was  as  good  as  a  gold  “  placer”  to  him.  He  was,  too,  a  bit 
superstitious,  and  this  staggered  him.  “  Oh,  you  do  wrong  to 
say  so,  madam  ;  it  is  the  best  boat  in  the  Mediterranean,” 
And  he  launched  off  into  an  eloquent  eulogium  on  her  merits, 
to  which  the  lady  retorted  with  certain  invidious  comparisons 
with  transatlantic  boats,  to  him  utterly  unintelligible-  The 
storm  abated,  tempers  grew  sweeter,  the  demand  for  tea  in¬ 
creased,  and  the  steward  was  appeased.  It  continued  to  rain, 
and  ventilation  was  impossible.  At  last  even  the  rain  ceased, 
and  those  able  to  stand  went  on  deck.  There  was  a  call  for 
the  wherewithal  for  the  morning  toilet.  Two  wash-bowls 
were  placed  on  the  dining-table,  which  had  just  ceased  doing 
duty  as  a  bedstead,  and  some  fifty  passengers  had  the  privi¬ 
lege  of  alternating  at  them,  or  going  ashore  dirty.  We  had 
entered  the  port  of  Leghorn,  and  were  detained  some  hours 
before  receiving  permission  to  go  ashore.  Then  the  captain 
detained  us  some  time  longer  before  he  would  order  his  crew 
to  leave  off  coaling  to  find  our  baggage,  which  they  had  stow¬ 
ed  away  among  the  freight.  Finally,  w^e  were  ready  to  be  ofl’. 
The  crew  demanded  something  for  delivering  to  us  our  bag¬ 
gage,  and  the  steward,  not  content  with  his  previous  fleecings, 
which  he  solemnly  swore  all  went  to  the  owners,  informed  us 
that  his  fee  was  so  much  a  head  ;  I  forget  how  much,  but  it 
was  a  bouncing  sum.  We  were  too  glad  to  put  our  feet  over 
the  gangway  not  to  say  Amen  to  every  imposition. 

The  old  proverb,  out  of  the  frying-pan,  &c.,  was  never  more 
practically  realized.  Leghorn  boatmen  are  a  cross  between 
New  York  hackmen  and  South  Sea  savages — a  compound  of 
importunity,  extortion,  and  indifference.  We  tumbled  right 
into  their  hands,  of  course,  as  their  boats  were  the  only  bridge 
to  the  shore.  We  paid  toll  accordingly.  They  delivered  us 
at  the  custom-house,  where  we  were  ushered  up  a  narrow 
stairway  into  a  dirty  office,  and  confronted  individually  with 


24  ITALIAN  SIGHTS  AND  PAPAL  PRINCIPLES.  , 


our  passports.  After  the  Grand  Duke’s  servants  were  satis¬ 
fied  that  the  Mr.  Jonathan,  Mrs.  Jonathan,  Miss  Jonathan,  and 
baby  Jonathan,  were  the  veritable  Jonathans,  of  the  same 
height,  color,  age,  form  of  nose,  and  signature,  as  certified  to 
by  the  Secretary  of  State  at  Washington,  then  we  were  gra¬ 
ciously  informed  we  could  go  about  our  ways  in  Leghorn  by 
taking  our  passports  to  another  office,  and  paying  the  lawful 
fee  therefor.  At  the  foot  of  the  stairs  we  were  beset  by  an 
avalanche  of  runners  of  every  description.  One  made  a  dive 
at  my  passport,  and  ran  off  with  it,  saying  he  would  soon  bring 
it  back,  all  right — for  a  fee.  The  hospitality  of  the  hotel 
agents  was  beyond  all  description.  Olympus  itself  never  pos¬ 
sessed  half  the  advantages  of  their  respective  houses.  One 
caught  me  by  the  left  arm  ,  another  by  the  dexter  ;  one  swore 
that  the  other  was  a  liar  and  would  take  me  in  ;  the  other  re¬ 
sponded  by  declaring  his  rival  to  be  the  greatest  rogue  in  Leg¬ 
horn,  which  was  equivalent  to  the  climax  of  rascality  the 
world  over.  All  offered  to  perform  for  me  every  possible  serv¬ 
ice.  Cards  were  thrust  into  my  hands  and  into  my  pockets. 
I  was  in  bodily  danger  of  being  carried  off  by  force,  had  not 
the  hackmen  overheard  me  declare  that  I  would  not  go  to  any 
hotel,  but  direct  to  the  rail-road.  This  created  a  diversion,  for 
they  rushed  forward  en  masse,  vociferating  in  Italian,  French, 
and  English  like  so  many  madmen.  To  witness  the  excite¬ 
ment,  one  would  suppose.that  but  one  traveler  ever  arrived  at 
Leghorn,  and  that  he  was  made  of  gold.  1  retreated  into  the 
police  station,  and  came  to  a  parley,  selecting,  no  doubt,  the 
greatest  rogue  among  them  on  condition  that  he  would  sec  me 
safe  from  the  others.  As  T  was  to  pay  him  quadruple  fare,  he 
became  a  stalwart  champion.  My  baggage  was  turned  upon 
the  quay,  searched,  and  found  according  to  tariff'.  Each  article 
was  seized,  and  borne  off  to  the  carriage  by  whomsoever  of 
the  crowd  the  spirit  moved.  It  was  useless  to  remonstrate. 


ITALIAN  SIGHTS  AND  PAPAL  PRINCIPLES. 


25 


Every  member  of  the  cortege  was  bound  to  touch  my  money 
this  day.  We  were  divided  between  two  carriages,  and  at¬ 
tempted  to  drive  off.  My  coachman  urged  on  his  houses,  but 
it  was  of  no  use.  There  was  still  somebody’s  claims  to  settle 
— more  bucksheesh.  I  had  already  paid  enough  to  have  car¬ 
ried  me  through  some  of  our  American  states,  and  had  got 
only  a  few  rods  from  the  quay.  The  coachman  fought  stoutly 
for  me,  the  crowd  and  he  disputing  at  the  top  of  their  voices, 
until  the  din  and  excitement  became  overpowering.  The  po¬ 
lice  looked  on  as  indifferently  as  if  every  thing  was  going  on 
as  well  as  could  be  expected.  Any  thing  was  better  than  be¬ 
ing  the  centre  of  such  a  circle.  I  took  out  my  purse.  The 
sight  of  it  was  like  oil  on  water.  “  How  much  does  the  beg¬ 
gar  want  ?”  He  named  the  sum — sufficient  for  him  to  have 
lived  on  for  a  week.  I  passed  it  to  him,  and  ordered  the  driver 
to  go  on.  He  drove  rapidly  to  escape  a  fresh  assault,  for  he 
wanted  me  entirely  to  himself.  He  contrived,  however,  to  be 
too  late  for  the  train,  and  then  he  had  a  proposition  to  make. 
He  would  take  me  to  Pisa  himself  for  a  consideration,  put  me 
through  all  the  sights,  and  see  me  safely  in  the  afternoon  train 
for  Florence.  I  cut  down  his  price  one  third,  and  told  him 
yes.  He  moved  about  it  with  an  alacrity  that  convinced  me 
that  he  respected  the  depth  of  my  purse,  and  therefore  he 
Jewed  me.  1  was  more  glad  to  get  out  of  Leghorn  than  I  had 
ever  been  to  get  out  of  the  Castore,  an  amount  of  pleasure  not 
often  condensed  into  the  experience  of  one  morning.  But  my 
baggage  had  all  to  be  reopened,  searched,  and  sealed  up  to 
avoid  examination  at  Pisa,  and  another  at  Florence.  The 
charge  for  this  was  cheap  in  comparison  with  the  trouble  saved. 
1  have  been  in  many  sea-ports  in  various  parts  of  the  world, 
and  in  them  all  combined  I  never  met  with  so  much  annoy¬ 
ance  and  imposition  as  were  condensed  into  two  hours  at  Leg¬ 
horn.  Not  so  remarkable  either,  when  we  consider  that  at 

B 


26 


ITALIAN  SIGHTS  AND  PAPAL  PRINCIP1>ES. 


Leghorn  a  galley-slave’s  suit,  that  has  upon  it  the  mark  of  a 
murder  or  assassination,  commands  a  premium  among  the 
criminals  who  sweep  the  streets,  because  it  attracts  notice  and 
alms,  as  the  badge  of  a*  dashing  fellow,  while  he  who  is  only 
distinguished  simply  by  the  stamp  of  a  thief  is  considered  but 
a  pitiful  chap,  and  is  but  too  glad  to  obtain  the  right  to  wear 
the  suit  of  deeper  hue. 

Was  I  wrong  to  be  grateful  to  my  coachman  for  having  at 
last  got  me  fairly  out  of  the  gates  of  Leghorn  1  He  was  a 
jovial,  communicative  fellow,  and  I  mounted  the  box  to  chat 
with  him.  There  was  nothing  worth  looking  at  on  the  road, 
not  even  the  Arno,  which,  where  we  crossed  it,  1  should  have 
mistaken  for  a  ditch  of  dirty  water  if  the  driver  had  not  ex¬ 
plained  its  consequence.  He  loved  America,  the  driver — he 
was  thinking  of  his  prospective  “  pour  boire”  when  he  said  it — 
and  wished  he  could  go  there.  He  was  a  Republican  himself. 
He  had  about  as  adequate  an  idea  of  the  institutions  of  the 
United  States  as  he  had  of  Timbuctoo.  The  Austrians  he 
hated  ;  the  Grand  Duke  was  a  fool  ;  the  stiletto  was  his  idea 
of  a  ballot-box,  and  the  good  time  was'  coming  when  republi¬ 
canism  would  avenge  its  recent  humiliations.  There  were 
many  like  him  all  over  the  country,  but  they  could  do  nothing 
so  long  as  Austrian  bayonets  were  in  sight.  I  asked  him  about 
the  brigands  on  the  roads.  “  They  call  them  brigands,”  he  re¬ 
plied,  “  but  they  are  Republicans.”  I  should  not  like  to  rely 
upon  their  spirit  of  “  fraternite”  to  spare  my  purse. 

We  arrived  at  Pisa  punctual  to  the  coachman’s  promise,  and 
he  drove  us  to  an  inn  of  his  own  selection  to  dine.  I  had 
given  myself  unreservedly  to  him  for  the  day  for  two  reasons  : 
first,  to  save  temper  and  trouble,  and,  secondly,  to  let  its  ex¬ 
perience  be  a  test  for  future  operations.  The  les.son  would  be 
worth  its  cost.  One  must  pay  an  initiative  fee  on  entrance 
into  society  any  where,  and  my  plan  was  to  condense  all  pos- 


ITALIAN  SIGHTS  AND  PAPAL  PRINCIPLES. 


27 


sible  varieties  of  Italian  tricks  upon  travelers  into  this  one  day, 
that  I  might  start  upon  the  morrow  with  clean  eyesight.  For 
the  dinner — a  shabby  affair — we  paid  just  treble  the  ordinary 
price,  but  it  was  economical  at  that,  as  it  taught  me  how  to 
deal  with  tricky  hosts. 

^  Jehu  procured  us  a  fresh  coach,  and  drove  us  to  see  the  lions. 
I  always  had  an  inclination  for  the  Leaning  Tower,  and  now 
was  gratified  to  see  that  it  had  an  inclination  toward  me  of 
thirteen  feet  from  the  perpendicular — so  they  say  who  have 
measured  it.  As  it  has  preserved  this  leaning  toward  man¬ 
kind  with  impartial  precision  for  six  centuries,  it  is  to  be  pre¬ 
sumed  that  no  future  generation  will  be  favored  with  any 
closer  intimacy.  Its  proportions  are  very  beautiful,  so  light 
and  elastic  that  if  it  should  tumble  over,  I  believe  it  would 
pick  itself  up  as  sound  as  ever.  From  the  Tower  we  passed 
to  the  Duomo.  Here  descended  upon  us  one  of  the  plagues, 
not  of  Egypt,  but  of  Italy,  in  the  shape  of  a  cicerone,  a  race 
who  seem  to  think  that  a  traveler  without  their  presence  is  as 
miserable  an  object  as  Peter  Schlemihl  without  his  shadow. 
My  Genoa  guide  was  a  jewel,  for  he  spoke  only  when  he  was 
spoken  to,  answered  questions  briefly  and  sensibly,  and  told 
only  what  he  knew  ;  but  the  tribe  that  waylay  travelers  on 
the  thresholds  of  monuments  are  in  general  as  great  nuisances 
as  were  the  money-changers  on  the  steps  of  the  Temple.  How¬ 
ever,  as  I  was  bent  on  learning  the  tricks  of  the  trade,  I  let 
him  pass  me  along  in  his  own  way.  We  got  through  the  ranks 
of  the  maimed,  leprous,  blind,  and  vermin-infested  horde  which, 
in  Italy,  cluster  about  the  entrances  of  churches,  nourished 
there,  as  toadstools  grow  in  the  same  soil  that  gives  life  to  the 
monarch  oak,  without  much  depletion  of  the  purse.  They 
were  reserving  their  final  onset  for  our  departure.  After  en¬ 
tering  the  magnificent  church,  worthy  itself  of  a  voyage  across 
the  Atlantic  to  see,  it  was  amusing  to  detect  the  brethren  of 


28 


ITALIAN  SIGHTS  AND  PAPAL  PRINCIPLES. 


our  cicerone  darting  at  the  sight  of  our  party  from  behind  col¬ 
umns  and  altars  toward  us,  like  spiders  from  their  holes  on 
their  prey,  and  slinking  reluctantly  back  upon  seeing  that  we 
were  already  bought  and  sold.  I  inwardly  chuckled  over  each 
disappointment,  and  formed  plans  how  for  the  future  I  would 
examine  churches  unmolested,  calling  for  a  guide  only  in  the 
last  extremity.  There  was  here  an  ancient  statue  of  Mars 
baptized  into  a  Saint  Ephese,  but  my  cicerone  was  too  good  a 
Catholic  to  call  my  attention  to  this  transformation,  though  the 
church  that  can  convert  even  the  stones  should  be  acknowl¬ 
edged  to  possess  miraculous  powers. 

From  the  church  we  passed  into  the  baptistery,  where  the 
guardian  was  by  no  means  disposed  to  allow  us  to  be  monop¬ 
olized  by  our  lawful  owner.  I  was  obliged  to  pay  him  some¬ 
thing  to  let  us  alone.  There  was  nothing  to  be  seen,  because 
a  scaffolding  totally  eclipsed  the  dome,  the  building  being  then 
in  that  interesting  state  called  restoration. 

Next  in  order  was  the  Campo  Santo,  the  most  interesting 
of  the  four  monuments  that  constitute  an  architectural  group 
unique  even  in  Italy  in  beauty  of  location,  artistic  wealth,  and 
historical  souvenirs.  Other  cities  possess  edifices  of  equal  or 
greater  pretensions  than  any  one  of  these,  but  none  can  boast 
four  such  gems  assembled  in  one  inclosure.  Formerly  the 
dead  were  admitted  into  the  Campo  Santo  by  paying  a  fee, 
but  of  course  they  never  left  it ;  there  was  nothing  more  to  be 
made  out  of  them.  Now  the  living  enter  gratis,  but  the  cus- 
tode’s  hand  must  be  crossed  with  silver  before  they  can  leave 
its  sepulchral  walls. 

This  cemetery  dates  from  1218,  but  was  not  finished  until 
1283.  It  is  a  vast  rectangle,  surrounded  by  porticoes  with 
sixty-two  semi-Gothic  arches.  The  interior  walls  are  covered 
with  frescoes  by  the  old  masters,  taken  from  scriptural  sub¬ 
jects.  The  guide  pointed  out,  with  particular  zest,  a  fancied 


ITALIAN  SIGHTS  AND  PAPAL  PRINCIPLES. 


5i9 


resemblance  between  the  portrait  of  Napoleon  and  the  head 
of  one  of  the  damned  writhing  in  the  flames  of  hell.  If  this 
were  accidental  it  was  singular,  as  the  resemblance  was  strik¬ 
ing  ;  but  if  the  work  of*  some  restoring  artist,  it  displays  at 
once  his  ingratitude  and  bigotry,  as  the  preservation  of  this 
monument  is  due  to  Napoleon.  The  earth  which  forms  the 
field  that  fills  the  hollow  square  inclosed  by  the  porticoes  was 
brought  from  the  holy  places  at  Jerusalem  in  fifty  galleys  of 
the  Republic  of  Pisa  in  1228.  It  is  now  covered  by  a  rich 
crop  of  grass  of  uniform  height,  like  a  mantle  of  green  velvet. 
It  has  been  long  disused  as  a  burial-place  ;  but  when  used,  it 
is  said  to  be  so  strongly  impregnated  with  acids  as  to  entirely 
decompose  the  fleshy  portions  of  corpses  within  forty-eight 
hours  after  their  burial.  One  of  these  frescoes  illustrates  this 
statement  in  a  somewhat  painfully  grotesque  style.  The  mag¬ 
istrates  of  Pisa  are  assembled  to  witness  the  disinterment  of 
three  bodies  that  have  lain  in  the  earth  longer  or  shorter  pe¬ 
riods  of  that  time.  The  coffins  are  placed  side  by  side  and 
uncovered.  The  first  two  display  different  stages  of  decompo¬ 
sition  too  repulsive  to  describe.  In  the  third  appeared  only 
the  skeleton,  the  earth  having  picked  the  bones  clean. 

The  floor  and  sides  of  the  arcades  are  crusted  with  tablets 
and  monuments  of  deceased  Pisans  ;  the  records  of  virtues  and 
talents  are  as  bountifully  accorded  the  dead  as  they  are  scantily 
awarded  to  the  living.  Master  chisels  of  all  ages,  from  John 
of  Pisa  to  Bartolini  and  Thorwaldsen,  have  helped  to  perpetu¬ 
ate  the  flattering  tale  of  ancestral  virtue  and  beauty.  It  is  an 
interesting  spot  as  a  museum  of  epitaphs,  and  a  chronological 
exhibition  of  painting  and  sculpture  for  six  hundred  years,  but 
for  a  burial-place  far  less  beautiful  and  appropriate  than  the 
rural  cemeteries  of  our  own  land. 

I  had  almost  forgotten  the  little  church  of  the  Holy  Mary  of 
the  Crown  of  Thorns,  a  fantastic  piece  of  architecture,  beauti- 


ITALIAN  SIGHTS  AND  PAPAL  PRINCIPLES. 


‘SO 


ful  in  its  way,  but  so  prolifically  spired  as  to  correspond  very 
well  with  its  name. 

On  leaving  the  Campo  Santo,  the  beggars  made  a  final  and 
desperate  charge  upon  us.  Two  women  in  the  very  last  stage 
of  filth  and  rags  seized  me  by  the  elbows,  and  by  the  love  of 
that  Virgin,  of  the  neglect  of  whose  worship  they  bore  in  their 
arms  living  evidence,  demanded  charity.  Aside  from  any 
motive  of  benevolence,  a  few  coins  were  well  applied  in  stop¬ 
ping  their  tongues  and  sending  them  in  pursuit  of  fresh  prey. 
The  guide  proved  the  greatest  beggar  of  all.  He  had  forced 
himself  upon  me  in  the  outset,  followed  me  about  for  an  hour, 
sold  me  a  number  of  enoravinjjs  of  the  monuments  from  his 
portfolio  at  double  the  shop  price,  and  now,  when  I  handed 
him  a  sum  that  would  have  drawn  out  of  any  Parisian  show¬ 
man  a  profusion  of  “  merci  biens”  and  an  avalanche  of  bows, 
he  bluntly  said  that  his  services  were  not  half  paid.  The  beg¬ 
gars,  thinking  their  right  to  a  stranger  as  good  as  his,  renewed 
their  importunities.  I  jumped  into  the  carriage,  threw  him  an¬ 
other  piece  of  silver  to  silence  his  tongue,  and  ordered  Jehu 
to  cut  short  all  farther  claims  by  driving  to  the  railway  station 
for  Florence.  As  we  passed  the  inn  at  which  we  had  dined, 
the  landlord  rushed  out  to  demand  a  new  contribution  in  the 
shape  of  a  bill  for  water  furnished  for  washing  hands.  Our 
driver  thought  this  a  little  too  strong  even  for  an  Italian  Boni¬ 
face,  and  summarily  told  him  to  go  about  his  business,  and  be 
content  with  his  first  exactions.  He  then  completed  his  con¬ 
tract  by  delivering  us  safely  and  in  season  at  the  cars,  and 
went  back  to  Leghorn  with  a  weightier  pocket  than  he  had 
had  for  many  a  day,  but  not  without  attempting  to  demonstrate 
to  me  that  he  had  not  individually  made  much  out  of  the  op¬ 
eration.  But  a  laughing  eye  and  profusion  of  thanks  were 
better  evidence  than  his  tongue. 

There  are  certain  davs  in  a  traveler’s  calendar  in  which  no 

0/ 


ITALIAN  SIGHTS  AND  PAPAL  PRINCIPLES. 


31 


amount  of  previous  experience  will  keep  him  on  the  right  track. 
He  is  doomed  to  he  humbugged  and  cheated  from  sunrise  to 
sunset — to  be  annoyed  and  crossed  in  every  thing  he  under¬ 
takes — to  have  the  weather  all  wrong,  and  to  be  the  special 
mark  for  every  species  of  pickpockets.  At  Leghorn  there  is 
no  escape  on  any  day.  The  only  way  is  to  quickly  abandon 
yourself  to  your  fate.  The  fewer  struggles,  the  fewer  scratches. 
On  the  morrow  one  can  laugh  heartily  over  the  storms  of  its 
predecessor.  It  is  usually  the  case,  when  one  most  wishes  to 
indulge  in  quiet  and  sentiment,  that  he  finds  most  noise  and 
distraction.  It  is  not  until  one  is  at  “  home”  in  Italy  that  he 
can  profitably  pursue  his  various  tastes,  free  from  the  interrup¬ 
tions  of  the  gallinipping  gentry  that  pursue  strangers  with  such 
relentless  fury.  It  was  amusing,  after  arriving  at  a  comforta¬ 
ble  hotel  at  Florence,  to  sum  up  the  day’s  experience.  We 
had  had  to  satisfy  six  stewards,  two  boatmen,  two  sailors,  three 
coachmen,  and  as  many  “pour  boires” — a  sum  which  every 
traveler  knows  has  no  limit  in  a  “  whip’s”  imagination — two 
landlords,  six  fees  for  baggage  and  passports,  to  have  six  trunks 
opened  and  searched  twice  within  an  hour,  four  guides,  and 
ten  porters,  rail-road  charges  and  beggars  not  included  ;  some 
thirty-odd  disbursements  on  a  distance  which,  in  America, 
would  have  been  traveled  over  in  two  hours  and  a  half,  at  a 
very  moderate  proportion  of  the  same  expense.  And  this  was 
not  all.  Our  progress  through  Leghorn  was  one  continual 
street-row.  Insatiable  porters  demanding  more,  and  quarrel¬ 
ing  among  themselves — commissionaires  yelling  in  our  ears  in 
difierent  tongues  the  praises  of  their  several  hotels — beggars 
whining  their  wants — the  coachmen  disputing  with  every  body, 
and  in  vain  endeavoring  to  whip  a  way  through  the  crowd. 
Our  baggage  did  not  belong  to  us — our  passports  were  not  our 
own — we  did  not  even  belong  to  ourselves  ;  and  it  was  not  un¬ 
til  we  promised,  on  our  return  to  Leghorn — which  God  forbid 


32 


ITALIAN  SIGHTS  AND  PAPAL  PRINCIPLES 


— that  we  would  put  up  at  as  many  different  hotels  as  there 
were  runners  in  the  crowd,  that  we  could  get  clear  of  this  gen¬ 
try.  Even  then  they  returned  to  refresh  our  memories  by 
thrusting  fresh  cards  into  our  hands.  To  add  to  the  comforts 
of  the  landing,  one  of  the  ladies  of  my  party  had,’ in  the  good¬ 
ness  of  her  heart,  promised  to  see  a  venerable  spinster,  who 
knew  not  a  word  of  any  language  but  the  English,  and  had 
come  thus  far  on  her  way  to  find  a  brother  at  Lucca,  safe  as 
far  as  Pisa.  The  old  maid — I  say  it  in  its  most  respectful 
sense,  for  she  was  the  impersonification  of  amiability  and  soft¬ 
ness — had  never  before  been  out  of  sight  of  her  village  steeple. 
She  had  started  by  herself  from  England  on  this  journey.  The 
consequence  was,  that  her  solitary,  antique  hair  trunk  and  cal¬ 
ico  bundle  went  to  London,  while  she  found  herself  at  Paris. 
It  took  a  week,  and  not  a  little  expense,  to  get  them  reunited. 
An  English  family  protected  her  as  far  as  Genoa,  and  then  con¬ 
signed  her  to  me.  It  was  a  pleasure  to  help  her,  she  was  so 
grateful ;  but,  before  we  left  Leghorn,  we  had  two  street  con¬ 
tests  on  her  account ;  that  is  to  say,  the  porters  perceived  her 
weakness,  which  was  to  pay  her  way  out  of  every  scrape  with 
an  open  purse,  and  made  scrapes  for  her  accordingly.  It  was 
no  use  insisting  that  she  was  one  of  my  party.  They  would 
not  stand  that  gammon.  She  must  pay  separately  for  every 
thing.  I  fought  stoutly  for  her  for  a  while,  but  it  was  of  no 
use.  At  the  custom-house,  the  officers,  attracted  by  the  sin¬ 
gularity  of  her  costume,  which,  perhaps,  savored  of  Republican 
simplicity  in  their  eyes,  insisted  upon  ransacking  her  trunk  and 
bundle  from  one  end  to  the  other.  Every  thing  was  turned 
out — bags  opened — ^bundles  unrolled — ^boxes  emptied  ;  it  was 
a  curious  collection.  The  poor  woman  stood  by,  weeping  bit¬ 
terly,  wringing  her  hands,  saying,  “  0  dear,  what  shall  I  do  ?” 
and  refusing  to  be  comforted.  This  but  rendered  the  officers 
more  suspicious.  They  were  looking,  evidently,  for  dispatches 


ITALIAN  SIGHTS  AND  PAPAL  PRINCIPLES. 


33 


from  Mazzini,  or  perhaps  they  expected  to  find  Kossuth  him¬ 
self  coiled  up  in  one  of  her  rolls  of  odds  and  ends,  the  gather¬ 
ings  of  a  long  life  of  neatness  and  saving.  Alas  for  them,  they 
found  only  a  yard  or  so  of  cotton,  some  pet  remnant,  which 
they  measured,  and  finding  it  an  inch  wider  than  Tuscan  law 
allowed,  charged  accordingly,  and  told  the  luckless  female  to 
repack  her  trunk.  She  was  too  bewildered  to  do  it  herself,  so 
we  did  it  for  her.  She  made  eight  more  charges  in  addition 
to  my  previous  list  before  we  discharged  her  at  Pisa,  but  I 
laughed  heartily  when  I  heard  her  explain,  after  all,  how  she 
had  thrown  dust  in  the  eyes  of  the  officers  of  the  customs  by 
bringing  a  new  silk  dress  in  the  piece,  cunningly  folded  up  in 
the  skirts  of  some  antiquated  garment.  She  was  not  so  unfit 
to  travel  by  herself,  after  all. 

If  any  one  thinks  that  I  have  done  injustice  to  Leghorn,  I 
refer  them  to  Dumas.  He  says,  “  1  have  been  to  Leghorn  three 
times  ;  the  last  two  I  was  forewarned — I  took  my  precautions  ; 
1  held  myself  upon  my  guard ;  each  time  I  paid  still  more 
dear.  I  never  knew  such  a  cut-throat  place  as  Leghorn.  One 
may  escape  being  robbed  on  the  Pontine  Marshes  sometimes, 
but  at  Leghorn — never.” 


B2 


CHAPTER  II. 


FLORENCE - ITS  APARTMENTS - PALACES - STREETS  AND  THEIR 

CUSTOMS - THE  PERGOLA  AND  THE  MISERICORDIA - BALLS, 

ETC. 

There  is  something  in  the  very  name  of  Florence  that  sug¬ 
gests  refinement  and  pleasurable  emotions.  It  is  a  delicious 
sound  in  itself,  and  of  all  others  the  most  appropriate  to  the 
floral  city  of  Italy.  It  recalls,  too,  the  peerless  queen  of  ancient 
sculpture,  the  Medicean  Venus,  and  the  triumph  of  modern  art 
in  Raphael’s  Madonna  della  Seggiola.  Great  names  belong  to 
its  history,  and  its  sons  have  bequeathed  immortal  works  to 
mankind.  It  was  then  with  involuntary  respect  and  admira¬ 
tion  that  I  entered,  for  the  first  time,  the  city  of  Dante  and 
Michael  Angelo,  and  trod  the  streets  that  had  echoed  to  the 
footsteps  of  Galileo  and  Lorenzo  the  Magnificent. 

There  is  something,  too,  peculiarly  fascinating  in  the  associ¬ 
ations  connected  with  Florence.  We  cluster  about  its  name, 
at  least  I  did,  palaces  and  villas  in  charming  profusion,  a  laugh¬ 
ing  landscape,  treasuries  of  art,  and  a  hospitality  which  makes 
it  a  paradise  for  exiles  in  pursuit  of  artistic  ease  or  literary 
quiet.  To  crown  all  these  advantages,  it  has  long  enjoyed  the 
reputation  of  being  the  cheapest  place  in  Europe.  I  had  not 
long  been  a  resident  before  I  discovered  that  Florence  was  like 
the  Arno,  extremely  variable  in  its  looks,  and  constantly  rush¬ 
ing  into  extremes.  The  first  aspect  is  its  worst.  It  so  im¬ 
proves  upon  acquaintance,  that,  like  a  delicious  fragrance,  it 
always  leaves  behind  a  pleasing  reminiscence. 

The  Arno,  which  divides  it,  is  a  most  capricious  river.  One 


ITALIAN  SIGHTS  AND  PAPAL  PRINCIPLES. 


35 


day  it  swells  to  a  fierce  torrent,  filling  the  wide  space  between 
the  quays  to  almost  a  level  with  their  embankments,  and  rushes 
along  with  terrific  force,  threatening  to  sweep  before  it  the 
massive  stone  bridges  which  dispute  its  passage.  On  the  next 
it  shrinks  to  a  most  consumptive-looking  stream,  barely  able  to 
find  its  way  over  its  own  sands,  and  which  a  thirsty  Arab 
might  almost  exhaust  at  one  draught.  During  the  ardent  heats 
of  summer  it  is  lost  amid  clouds  of  dust.  Then  Florence  emp¬ 
ties  itself  into  the  country,  for  even  the  barber  has  his  villa, 
and  apartments,  like  tombs,  gape  for  occupants. 

.My  first  object  was  to  secure  an  apartment.  It  was  the 
season  when  all  the  world  returns  to  the  city,  and  its  inhabi¬ 
tants  expect  in  four  months  to  make  enough  out  of  the  fleeting 
crowd  of  Americans,  English,  French,  and  Russians  to  live  on 
during  the  entire  twelve. 

There  was  something  seductive  to  even  a  republican  imag¬ 
ination  coupled  with  the  idea  of  livirig  in  a  palace,  and  pos¬ 
sessing  a  garden  ornamented  with  fountains  and  statues.  Ac¬ 
cordingly,  I  commenced  my  search  with  them.  There  was  no 
lack  ;  but  their  exteriors,  with  the  exception  of  a  certain  grace¬ 
ful  solidity,  bore  more  resemblance  to  our  ideas  of  prisons  than 
luxurious  mansions.  I  fancied  them  rather  to  be  cut  out  of 
the  solid  rock  than  built  up  stone  by  stone.  Such  were  the 
rival  palaces  of  the  Strozzi,  Riccardi,  Pitti,  and  the  old  repub¬ 
lican  stronghold,  the  Palazzo  Vecchio.  These  were  the  types 
of  all  of  the  olden  time,  when  every  house  was  a  citadel,  and 
each  family  an  independent  power,  struggling  for  life  and  for¬ 
tune  with  its  neighbor.  Their  proportions  are  fine,  and  their 
general  appearance  very  imposing,  but  they  are  far  from  an¬ 
swering  to  our  modern  ideas  of  a  palatial  residence,  especially 
if  we  have  derived  our  taste  from  the  beautiful  structures  of 
Paris.  Their  interiors  are  arranged  on  the  same  Titanic  scale. 
Apartments  so  lofty  that  the  eye  fairly  aches  in  the  endeavor 


36 


ITALIAN  SIGHTS  AND  PAPAL  PRINCIPLES 


to  trace  out  the  ornaments  of  the  ceiling,  while  the  feet  per¬ 
ish  with  cold  on  damp  mosaic  floors.  The  windows  require 
a  series  of  steps  to  reach  their  sills,  and  the  doors  and  chim¬ 
neys  evolve  a  series  of  petrifying  draughts  that  few  modern  con¬ 
stitutions  are  proof 
against.  In  gener¬ 
al,  the  palaces  are 
built  on  narrow,  dark 
streets,  guiltless  of 
side-walks,  and  are 
impartially  scatter¬ 
ed  all  over  the  city, 
amidst  characteristic 
styles  of  architecture 
of  lesser  pretensions. 
These  have  now  de¬ 
generated  into  the 
abodes  of  poverty,  so 
that,  with  the  excep¬ 
tion  of  a  few  modern 
innovations,  no  por¬ 
tion  of  the  city  can 
claim  an  aristocratic 
preference  over  an¬ 
other. 

The  Strozzi  Pal¬ 
ace  is  the  finest  spe¬ 
cimen  of  this  type 
of  mansions,  from 
which  cold  magnifi¬ 
cence  and  architect¬ 
ural  efl'ect  banished 
STROZZI  PALACE.  coHifort  and  sociabil- 


ITALIAN  SIGHTS  AND  PAPAL  PRINCIPLES. 


37 


ity.  It  still  belongs  to  the  family  that  erected  it  in  1489,  and 
looks  as  if  it  might  continue  to  stand  until  Time,  in  its  march 
reversing  those  figures,  shall  tell  its  age  by  thousands  instead 
of  hundreds  of  years.  There  are  but  three  stories,  but  each 
story  attains  itself  the  height  of  an  American  house.  Its  in¬ 
terior  arrangements  are  on  a  scale  of  gloomy  grandeur,  so  much 
beyond  the  wants  of  even  a  Florentine  noble,  with  his  numer¬ 
ous  train  of  dependants,  that  not  many  years  since,  some  of  the 
children  of  the  family,  in  playing,  discovered  a  suite  of  twelve 
rooms  entirely  unknown  to  the  proprietor.  The  door  had  been 
walled  up  for  two  hundred  years,  and  no  one  in  this  vast  edi¬ 
fice  had  missed  the  space  thus  mysteriously  closed.  There  is 
no  garden  attached  to  this  palace.  The  interior  forms  a  hol¬ 
low  square,  paved  with  flat  stones,  with  nothing  to  relieve  the 
dungeon-like  aspect  of  the  massive  walls. 

There  are  ancient  palaces  of  this  character,  but  on  a  lesser 
scale,  scattered  throughout  the  city,  which  offer  furnished  apart¬ 
ments  to  strangers  at  prices  cheap  enough  for  the  space  they 
proffer,  but  too  dear  for  the  amount  of  comfort  they  have  in 
store.  If  it  be  winter,  the  gardens  are  a  nuisance,  because 
the  frequent  rains  keep  them  so  damp  as  to  be  prejudicial  to 
health.  Italians,  profiting  by  the  experience  of  centuries,  do 
not  plant  their  squares  and  open  spaces,  as  we  do,  with  grass 
and  shrubbery,  but  scrupulously  exclude  all  vegetation,  believ¬ 
ing  it  in  cities  to  be  unwholesome.  Their  squares  are  either 
paved  or  Macadamized.  Thus  all  the  anticipated  pleasures 
of  orange  groves  and  smiling  gardens  dissolve  in  Florence,  dur¬ 
ing  winter,  like  “  the  baseless  fabric  of  a  dream”  before  the 
superior  considerations  of  health.  The  chief  object  is  to  ob¬ 
tain  a  sunny  aspect.  There  are  comparatively  few  such,  and 
they  cammand  higher  prices  in  consequence.  The  truth  is, 
that  the  boasted  Italian  climate  is  as  treacherous  as  a  coquette. 
You  never  know  when  you  are  on  good  terms  with  it.  It 


38  ITALIAN  SIGHTS  AND  PAPAL  PRINCIPLES. 


weeps  and  smiles  in  the  same  instant.  On  the  shady  side  of 
the  street  you  are  frozen,  and  on  the  sunny  side  roasted.  The 
breeze,  when  most  wooing,  is  most  to  be  suspected.  In  short, 
you  must  keep  constantly  on  the  qui  vive  to  stop  the  numerous 
^colds,  rheumatisms,  fevers,  and  pleurisies  that  are  floating  about 
in  the  atmosphere,  before  they  can  obtain  a  lodgment  in  your 
body.  I  dislike  a  climate  that  keeps  one  in  a  constant  fuss. 
There  are  some  so  hospitable  that  the  stranger  can  abandon 
himself  without  reserve  to  their  keeping,  taking  no  thought 
for  the  coming  shower,  and  welcoming  without  suspicion  the 
grateful  breeze,  whether  it  be  that  of  noonday  or  midnight. 
With  them,  a  current  of  air  is  not  loaded  with  ills  to  the  hu¬ 
man  frame,  nor  does  a  meridian  sun  prove  false  to  its  smiling 
face.  Such  is  the  climate  of  the  Hawaiian  group,  the  para¬ 
dise  of  invalids  and  amateurs  of  a  pure  atmosphere. 

The  furniture  in  general  of  the  furnished  apartments  ap¬ 
pears  to  have  migrated  hither  from  the  “  maisons  meuhles^^  of 
Paris  and  the  lodging-houses  of  London,  after  having  been 
turned  out  of  their  doors  as  unfit  for  farther  service.  The  at¬ 
tempts  at  neatness  and  embellishment  are  mournfully  ludi¬ 
crous  ;  but,  as  the  standard  of  an  American  for  home  comforts 
must  necessarily  be  considerably  lowered  before  he  reaches 
Italy,  he  views  these  things  with  a  less  fastidious  eye,  and 
charitably  pities  their  owners  for  knowing  no  better.  Habits 
and  tastes  partake  of  the  fluctuating  extremes  of  the  climate. 
In  the  birth -^lace  of  the  chef-d’oBuvres  of  art,  and  models  of 
refined  and  celestial  beauty,  we  find  customs  more  disgusting 
and  tastes  more  barbarous  than  among  even  semi-savages. 
Sights  are  daily  seen  in  the  most  public  places  which,  in  the 
United  States,  would  send  their  authors  to  the  Penitentiary  for 
a  violation  of  public  decency,  while  many  streets — even  those 
pretending  to  rank  among  the  best — are  almost  impassable  on 
account  of  their  filthy  condition.  This  arises  from  the  neglect 


ITALIAN  SIGHTS  AND  PAPAL  PRINCIPLES. 


39 


of  providing  in  their  houses  what  in  England  and  America 
are  considered  indispensable  adjuncts  of  even  the  meanest  of 
habitations.  When  changes  have  been  made,  it  has  been 
owing  to  the  demands  of  travelers,  and  the  absolute  necessity, 
if  Italy  would  not  starve,  of  catering  to  their  wants. 

Carpets,  too,  and  fire-places  capable  of  supporting  a  fire,  are 
modern  innovations.  Florentines  manage  to  live  without 
both,  when  strangers  from  northern  climes  would  be  chilled  to 
the  very  marrow.  A  few  coals  in  an  earthen  dish  sufiice  to 
keep  their  blood  in  motion,  and  if  their  feet  are  cold,  they 
thrust  them  into  woolen  mufis.  These  are  homely  things  to 
mention  in  connection  with  the  classical  soil  of  Italy  ;  but,  as 
all  the  world  either  comes  or  wishes  to  come  hither,  I  am 
sure  they  will  pardon  me  for  mentioning  a  few  things  not  usu¬ 
ally  to  be  found  in  travels  or  guide-books. 

The  distribution  of  the  houses  and  palaces  is  the  same  as  at 
Paris,  into  stories  for  separate  families,  only  they  rarely  have 
'porte  cochereSy'"  and  less  seldom,  porters.  It  is  very  difficult, 
therefore,  to  find  a  friend  after  finding  his  house.  No  one 
pretends  to  know  the  names  of  the  streets,  for  each  corner  has 
a  separate  christening.  The  houses  throughout  the  city  are 
numbered  from  one  up  to  ten  thousand,  as  may  be,  and,  as  the 
series  is  not  always  a  neighborly  one,  a  stranger  is  often 
greatly  puzzled  where  to  begin  his  search.  Supposing  the 
house  found,  he  has  before  him  a  narrow  door,  by  the  side  of 
which  he  finds  a  perpendicular  row  of  bells,  one  answering  to 
each  apartment,  and  numbered  accordingly.  These  bells  com¬ 
municate  with  the  difierent  stories,  and  from  them  descend 
stout  wires  to  the  door-latch,  passing  sometimes  outside  of  the 
house,  and  sometimes  in,  so  that  every  house  has  the  appear¬ 
ance  of  being  a  telegraph  office.  You  ring  by  chance  one  of 
these  bells — one  of  the  wires  is  set  in  motion,  the  door  thrown 
open,  and  you  find  yourself  in  an  unlighted  entry,  looking  more 


40 


ITALIAN  SIGHTS  AND  PAPAL  PRINCIPLES. 


like  the  entrance  to  some  subterranean  vault  than  to  a  gentle¬ 
man’s  house.  A  voice  from  an  immeasurable  distance  above 
calls  out,  “  Who’s  there?”  You  respond,  “A  friend,”  or  “A 
robber,”  if  you  wish  to  be  waggish.  If  it  be  night,  and  you 
have  forgotten  to  bring  your  pocket-taper,  you  must  grope  your 
way  up  an  intricate  and  narrow  staircase  as  you  best  may,  or 
do  as  I  have  often  done,  beat  a  retreat  in  utter  despair,  for  you 
can  not  see  an  inch  beyond  your  nose.  The  custom  is  not  to 
light  the  staircases — the  exceptions  are  only  the  grand  man¬ 
sions.  You  have  counted  a  hundred  steps,  omitting  some  in 
the  agony  of  a  battered  shin,  and  at  last  find  yourself  at  about 
what  you  consider  the  elevation  which  your  friend,  who  is  an 
amateur  of  sunlight,  has  selected  for  a  lodging.  Groping  about 
for  a  bell,  if  you  succeed  in  that  search,  a  voice  within,  in  a 
shrill  key,  demands  again,  “  Who’s  there  ?”  If  satisfied  that 
yours  has  an  innocent  fing,  the  door  is  opened,  and  you  dis¬ 
cover  that  your  friend  lives  on  the  opposite  side  of  the  street, 
just  one  story  higher.  You  prefer  to  meet  him  at  Doney’s,  or 
at  the  Cascine,  to  undertaking  again  to  find  him  in  his  lair. 
Indeed,  the  difficulties  attending  a  domestic  exploration  are  so 
well  understood,  that  calls  are  considered  as  honored  when 
returned  at  the  Casino  or  any  of  the  public  rendezvous.  An 
Italian  talks  very  little  about  his  home. 

There  are  some  neat  and  well-furnished  apartments  at  Flor¬ 
ence,  but  to  be  found,  they  must  be  diligently  sought.  The 
average  of  such  as  strangers  occupy  are  as  I  have  described, 
with  two  prices,  according  to  the  season,  summer  paying  but 
half  the  rate  of  winter.  An  apartment  in  a  palace  of  from 
twelve  to  twenty  or  more  rooms,  furnished,  including  silver 
and  linen,  with  a  kitchen  ample  enough  for  a  regiment,  and 
the  privilege  of  a  garden,  costs  fifty  dollars  a  month.  A  Tus¬ 
can  dollar  is  equal  to  eleven  dimes  United  States  currency. 
Apartments  of  more  moderate  pretensions,  smaller  rooms,  and. 


ITALIAN  SIGHTS  AND  PAPAL  PRINCIPLES. 


41 


therefore,  more  easily  warmed,  but  large  enough  for  a  family, 
abound  at  from  twenty  to  forty  dollars  per  month  for  the  win¬ 
ter.  A  bachelor  can  find  passable  accommodation  as  low  as 
five  dollars,  and  obtain  by  the  year  a  fine  suite  of  rooms,  un¬ 
furnished,  for  fifty  dollars.  The  best  situations  in  new  houses, 
including  modern  improvements,  bath-roorns,  &c.,  can  be  had 
for  about  thrice  that  sum.  But  there  is  a  Florentine  maxim 
which  strangers  would  do  well  to  keep  in  mind :  “  Let  your 
house  the  first  year  to  your  enemy,  the  second  to  your  ac¬ 
quaintance,  and  the  third  to  your  friend” — a  new  house,  from 
the  mode  of  construction,  being  considered  unwholesome,  as 
it  takes  a  long  time  to  dry.  Villas  go  a  begging.  In  the 
summer  they  are  comfortable,  but  in  winter  damp  and  chilly. 
Where  houses  are  built  almost  exclusively  of  stone  and  mor¬ 
tar,  with  a  copious  provision  of  currents  of  air,  this  must  be 
expected. 

The  market  is  well  supplied,  at  low  prices.  At  the  cafes 
and  restaurants,  a  breakfast  costs  eleven  cents,  and  a  good 
enough  dinner  thirty-three.  At  the  table  d’hote  of  hotels, 
fifty-five,  and  an  excellent  meal  at  that.  But,  for  those  who 
wish  to  avoid  the  annoyances  of  providing  for  the  table,  the 
“  trattori,”  or  public  cooks,  supply  meals  of  every  quality  and 
cost,  served  up  at  any  hour  in  any  part  of  the  city.  For  one 
dollar  and  a  quarter  per  day,  a  friend  of  mine  was  well  served 
for  five  persons  with  a  dinner  consisting  of  soup,  three  courses 
of  meat,  several  of  vegetables,  wine,  and  a  dessert  of  pastry 
and  fruit.  Clothing  and  most  other  articles  are  cheaper  than 
in  the  United  States,  and  the  services  of  the  best  professors 
in  music,  languages,  and  education  generally,  can  be  had  for 
about  one  half  the  price.  In  short,  if  one  can  reconcile  him¬ 
self  to  Florentine  habits,  sharp  wine,  water  so  hard  that  it 

makes  you  fear  that  you  will  eventually  become  a  stalactite, 

# 

the  loss  of  politics  and  newspapers,  and  odors  that  are  the  more 


42 


ITAIJAN  SIGHTS  AND  PAPAL  PRINCIPLES 


aggravating  from  being  unnecessary,  Plorence  is  the  city  for 
the  money. 

This  is  not  all.  There  is  another  annoyance,  which,  as  it  is 
the  exclusive  property  of  pretty  women,  I  mention,  that  they 
may  go  forewarned.  It  is  as  bad  in  many  other  European  cit¬ 
ies,  but  there  is  in  it  something  more  ludicrous  at  Florence 
than  elsewhere. 

Fashion  tells  the  ladies,  with  reason,  that  they  must  not 
walk.  The  streets  generally  are  in  too  uninviting  a  condition 
for  such  an  operation,  where  skirts  are  to  be  employed,  and 
Bloomerism  has  not  yet  made  its  advent  here.  Besides,  it  is 
apparent  that  they  were  intended  only  for  carriages  and  beg¬ 
gars.  There  are  a  few  places  where  they  might  walk,  were 
it  not  for  the  abominable  habits  of  the  male  population.  For¬ 
eign  ladies  frequently  attempt  it,  and  it  is  forgiven  in  them  by 
the  Florentines  on  the  score  of  their  being  strangers  and 
knowing  no  better.  Old  and  ugly  women  can  do  it  with  im¬ 
punity  any  where,  at  any  time.  But  let  a  lady  of  even  ordi¬ 
nary  attractions  attempt  it  by  herself,  or  in  company  with  oth¬ 
ers  of  her  sex,  and  if  she  be  not  vexed,  astonished,  mortified, 
and  amused  before  she  regains  her  own  roof,  it  will  be  because 
she  proves  an  exception  to  an  otherwise  general  rule.  When 
she  least  expects  it,  some  impudent  clown  or  peasant  suddenly 
pokes  his  ugly,  dirty  face  right  under  her  bonnet,  makes  a 
mock  kiss,  cries  “  boo,”  or  some  such  intelligible  sound,  or 
compliments  her  with  a  “  cara”  or  some  equally  loving  epi¬ 
thet,  and  walks  innocently  off,  with  his  hands  in  his  pockets, 
before  her  astonishment  has  had  time  to  jump  into  indignation. 
If  she  escape  these  low  vagabonds,  she  is  sure  to  attract  the 
race  of  gentlemen,  who,  having  nothing  else  to  do,  amuse 
themselves  by  following  ladies.  The  less  impudent  dog  them 
at  a  distance,  but  near  enough  to  let  thein  know  that  every 
motion  is  watched  and  commented  upon.  The  bolder  pass 


ITALIAN  SIGHTS  AND  PAPAL  PRINCIPLES. 


43 


and  repass,  to  take  a  good  stare  ;  walk  ahead,  that  they  may 
return  and  meet  them,  saying  flattering  things  in  an  under 
tone,  with  the  intention  of  being  overheard.  The  boldest 
come  alongside,  and  let  fly  a  complimentary  volley,  without 
any  compunctions,  much  amused  if  an  inexperienced  damsel 
involuntarily  jumps-  aside  at  such  an  unlooked-for  tribute  to 
her  attractions.  There  was  one  young  Florentine  who  made 
himself  quite  conspicuous  at  this  sort  of  pastime.  He  could 
speak  a  few  words  of  English,  and  had  a  mania  for  running 
after  foreign  ladies,  and  launching  upon  their  astonished  ears 
the  extent  of  his  philological  acquirements.  His  vocabulary 
was  confined  to  a  few  flattering  ejaculations.  One  day  he 
overtook  an  English  lady  and  her  daughters.  He  was  but  a 
pint  measure  of  a  man,  but  he  boldly  gave  chase,  and,  coming 
up,  called  out,  “Yery  good,”  ‘‘very  much  pretty,”  “I  like,” 
“  you 'handsome,”  rattling  on  as  fast  as  his  tongue  would  per¬ 
mit.  First  he  would  be  on  one  side,  then  on  another,  now 
heading  them,  now  sailing  round,  and  cutting  such  absurd  ca¬ 
pers  that  the  ladies  could  not  refrain  from  smiling.  This  he 
took  for  encouragement,  and  plied  his  battery  of  admiration 
more  vigorously  than  ever.  The  lady,  at  last  arriving  at  her 
own  door,  suddenly  entered,  while  he,  more  intent  upon  her 
than  his  own  ways,  pitched  over  a  donkey,  that  laid  him 
sprawling  in  the  street.  This,  with  a  hint  that  a  little  birch 
would  be  applied  to  his  skin  the  next  time  he  ventured  upon 
a  similar  experiment,  cured  him  for  a  while  ;  but  the  last  I 
heard  of  him  he  was  on  the  watch  to  waylay  some  American 
ladies  as  they  descended  from  their  carriages,  popping  up  sud¬ 
denly  under  their  noses  like  a  phantom,  with  his  everlasting 
“  very  much  pleased,”  and  “  charming  ladies,”  from  which 
amusement  nothing  short  of  a  thorough  drubbing  is  likely  to 
cure  him.  The  plain  truth  is,  that  a  pretty  lady,  though  safe 
from  violence,  is  not  safe  from  impertinence  at  any  time  of  the 


44 


ITALIAN  SIGHTS  AND  PAPAL  PRINCIPLES. 


day  in  Florence.  Consequently,  she  must  keep  a  carriage  if 
she  would  go  out,  so  that  whatever  economy  there  may  he  in 
Florence,  in- other  respects,  over  other  capitals,  it  is,  in  the 
main,  lost  in  the  extra  expense  of  horseflesh.  Or,  in  other 
words,  the  difference  of  prices  between  Paris  and  Florence  in 
the  essentials  of  housekeeping  enables  one  to  keep  a  carriage 
in  the  capital  of  Tuscany. 

There  is  still  another  indispensable  expense,  if  a  family  de¬ 
sire  to  enter  within  the  charmed  circle  of  “  society,”  and  this 
is  a  box  at  the  Pergola,  in  one  of  the  three  tiers  classified  as 
noble.  Although  it  costs  a  stranger  a  third  more  than  a  Flor¬ 
entine^ — this  same  ratio  obtains  in  every  thing  else — it  is  not 
a  costly  affair.  One  hundred  and  twenty-five  to  one  hundred 
and  fifty  dollars  will  pay  the  cost  of  a  season  of  several  months, 
and  this  expense  may  be  reduced  by  imitating  the  example  of 
the  Florentines,  and  letting  the  box  on  nights  when  not  want¬ 
ed.  You  may  dispense  with  receptions  chez-vous^^'*  but  it  is 
an  unpardonable  sin  in  the  world  of  fashion  not  to  be  at  home 
at  the  Opera.  The  world  goes  to  the  Opera  as  to  a  reunion. 
There  they  pay  their  visits,  chat,  laugh,  partake  of  refresh¬ 
ments,  turn  their  backs  upon  the  stage — in  short,  almost  drown 
by  their  conversation  the  music.  The  Opera  is  nothing ;  the 
assemblage  of  fa*shion  every  thing.  A  box,  then,  at  the  Pergo¬ 
la  is  really  an  economical  affair,  as  it  saves  the  expense  of  so¬ 
ciety  under  one’s  roof ;  it  is  a  most  amusing  one,  from  the  va¬ 
riety  of  ranks,  nations,  and  toilets  there  represented.  The 
English  astonish  there,  as  every  where,  with  their  brilliant 
colors,  forests  of  plumes,  and  bizarre  costumes  ;  the  Russians 
with  their  mines  of  precious  stones  ;  the  Germans  with  their 
fair  hair  and  brilliant  complexions ;  the  Florentines  by  their 
princely  jewels,  laces,  and  velvets,  drawn  from  their  imper¬ 
ishable  hereditary  stores ;  the  French  eclipse  all  by  th^ir 
matchless  elegance,  seemingly  so  simple  and  unstudied ;  while 


ITALIAN  SIGHTS  AND  PAPAL  PRINCIPLES. 


45 


the  Americans  please  all  from  their  rarity  and  general  good 
taste. 

The  theatre  is  so  constructed  that  while  one  half  of  the  au¬ 
dience  of  the  boxes  can,  if  they  choose,  look  toward  the  stage, 
the  other  half  are  necessarily  turned  toward  the  imperial  box, 
which  is  quite  a  hall  of  itself.  Of  course,  the  architect  never 
contemplated  in  his  design  the  spectacle  as  the  main  object 
of  the  edifice.  It  is  merely  an  auxiliary.  If  an  opera,  it  at¬ 
tracts  attention  only  from  novelty  or  the  harmony  of  par¬ 
ticular  strains.  But  the  ballet,  which  is  introduced  between 
the  acts  of  the  Opera,  rivets  the  attention  of  all.  It  is  strange, 
but  true,  that  a  Florentine  audience  prefers  poor  dancing  to 
good  music.  While  the  American,  Miss  Maywood,  was  with 
them,  they  had  a  legitimate  excuse  for  their  passion,  for  a 
more  elastic,  untiring,  and,  the  Italians  say,  graceful  danseuse 
never  appeared  on  any  boards.  They  exalt  her  above  Cerito, 
Ellsler,  and  even  Taglioni.  But  what  carried  them  away 
nightly  into  a  tempest  of  applause  was  the  perfection  of  her 
time.  The  music  and  her  limbs  moved  in  such  entire  accord 
as  to  seem  but  one  impulse.  “  Bravas  and  encores”  thun¬ 
dered  over  the  house.  Hands,  feet,  and  lips  were  all  in  vio¬ 
lent  commotion  in  all  quarters.  No  eloquence  could  have 
excited  the  susceptible  Florentines  to  half  such  a  pitch  of 
“  furore”  as  her  legs.  Bouquets  as  large  as  wine-barrels  were 
precipitated  upon  the  stage,  their  numerous  ribbons  fluttering 
gayly  in  the  air  as  they  fell,  like  the  pennants  from  a  mast¬ 
head.  She  fairly  staggered  under  their  weight.  On  one  oc¬ 
casion,  the  prima  donna,  having  vainly  essayed  to  carry  off  a^ 
monster  bouquet,  gracefully  drew  it  behind  the  scenes  by  its 
ribbons,  courtesying  as  she  backed  across  the  stage,  amid  the 
cheers  of  the  spectators.  At  Maywood’s  benefit  it  took  three 
carriages  to  carry  away  the  floral  avalanche  tumbled  at  her 
feet. 


43 


ITALIAN  SIGHTS  AND  PAPAL  PRINCIPLES. 


There  are  nine  theatres  and  Operas  in  the  little  city  of  Flor¬ 
ence,  but,  with  the  exception  of  the  Pergola,  of  no  pretensions 
to  fashion  or  elegance.  The  Cocomero  is  a  very  humble  and 
unsuccessful  imitator  .of  the  Thdatre  Fran9aise  at  Paris.  At 
all  there  is  a  price  of  entry,  in  addition  to  which  another  sum 
•  is  demanded  for  seats  not  in  the  parterre.  There  are  two  Op¬ 
eras  where  the  Tuscans  can  listen  to  the  music  of  Mozart,  Ros¬ 
sini,  or  Donizetti  for  five  cents,  and  the  cheapest  of  the  the¬ 
atres  did  provide  a  night’s  entertainment  for  a  trifle  less  than 
three  cents,  commencing  at  eight  and  terminating  past  mid¬ 
night. 

It  is  at  the  Opera,  perhaps,  that  the  attention  is  first  drawn 
toward  a  society  which  ranks  in  the  annals  of  Roman  Catho¬ 
lic  benevolence  second  only  in  good  works  to  that  of  the  Sisters 
of  Charity.  Not  unfrequently,  in  the  midst  of  one  of  May¬ 
wood’s  marvelous  pirouettes,  the  sharp  tone  of  a  bell  strikes 
upon  the  ear.  All  listen.  If  it  sounds  but  once,  it  is  the  sig¬ 
nal  of  an  ordinary  accident ;  if  twice,  a  grave  casualty ;  if  three 
times,  a  death.  It  is  the  bell  of  the  Misericordia.  From  all 
parts  of  the  house,  spectators  rise  one  by  one,  and  abruptly 
leave.  Probably  the  gentleman  with  whom  you  are  conversing, 
if  an  Italian,  excuses  himself,  takes  his  hat,  and  departs.  The 
audience  turn  toward  the  stage,  and  in  a  minute  the  interrup¬ 
tion  is  forgotten. 

The  Society  of  Misericordia  is  one  of  the  purest  and  noblest 
charities  with  which  the  Christian  religion  has  blessed  the 
world.  It  took  its  rise  in  1244,  when  the  plague  ravaged  Eu- 
'  rope.  For  six  centuries  it  has  maintained  its  existence,  true 
to  the  holy  principles  of  its  original  foundation,  a  fact,  perhaps, 
without  a  parallel  in  the  history  of  humanity.  It  represents, 
in  different  proportions,  the  aristocracy,  the  liberal  arts,  and 
the  people.  The  artisans  of  Florence,  moved  by  the  contagions 
that  desolated  their  city,  leaving  multitudes  of  sick  without 


ITALIAN  SIGHTS  AND  PAPAL  PRINCIPLES 


4 


succor,  and  of  dead  without  burial,  were  the  first  to  conceive 
the  sublime  idea  of  its  institution.  The  wealthy  added  their 
donations,  and  the  society  soon  took  rank  among  the  most  im¬ 
portant  institutions  of  charity. 

The  Brethren  of  Pity,  or  the  Misericordia,  are  under  the  di- 


4S 


ITALIAN  SIGHTS  AND  PAPAL  PRINCIPLES. 


rection  of  seventy-two  members,  called  “  Capi  di  Gardia”  (chiefs 
of  watch).  These  regulate  the  works  of  charity,  the  adminis¬ 
tration  of  its  revenues,  which  are  considerable,  and  the  distri¬ 
bution  of  alms.  They  are  composed  of  ten  prelates,  fourteen 
nobles,  twenty  priests,  and  twenty-eight  artisans.  Under  their 
immediate  orders  are  two  hundred  and  eighty  “  giornanti,”  or 
journeymen,  secular  and  ecclesiastical.  Forty  of  these  are  al¬ 
ways  on  service.  There  are,  besides,  inscribed  on  their  lists, 
voluntarily,  the  names  of  more  than  twelve  hundred  other 
brethren,  called  “  buonevoglie,”  whom  they  can  call  upon  at 
any  moment  to  assist  in  their  charitable  labors. 

The  office  of  the  Misericordia  is  in  the  Piazza  del  Duomo. 
Each  brother  on  duty  keeps  there,  marked  with  his  name,  a 
box  containing  his  black  robe,  which  covers  him  from  head  to 
foot.  They  are  such  as  penitents  formerly  wore,  with  open¬ 
ings  only  for  the  mouth  and  eyes,  in  order  that  the  incognito  of 
charity,  recommended  by  Christ,  shall  be  strictly  preserved. 
As  soon  as  the  signal  is  heard  that  their  services  are  required, 
the  members  on  duty  assemble  at  their  office,  assume  their 
mournful  habit — which  no  one  can  see  for  the  first  time  with¬ 
out  being  strangely  affbcted — receive  their  orders,  and  proceed 
to  the  scene  of  their  duties.  Some  are  required  to  carry  the 
diseased  or  wounded  to  the  hospitals,  or  other  places,  as  need 
may  be.  Others  devote  themselves  to  nursing  in  the  homes 
of  the  ill  and  infirm  poor.  They  often  pass  days  and  nights 
at  their  bedsides,  bestowing  upon  them  those  attentions  which 
try  even  the  constancy  of  friendship  and  the  affinities  of  blood. 
In  every  place,  at  any  hour,  wherever  an  accident  calls,  a 
groan  is  heard,  or  there  are  misery  and  suffering  to  be  re¬ 
lieved,  the  Brothers  of  Pity  are  required,  by  their  voluntary 
bond  of  good  deeds,  to  bestow  their  alms  and  their  offices.  It 
matters  not  what  may  be  the  origin  of  the  poor  victim,  or 
whether  he  confesses  Christ,  Moses,  or  Mohammed.  Their 


ITALIAN  SIGHTS  AND  PAPAI.  PRINCIPLES. 


40 


charity  blesses  alike  all  men,  without  distinction  of  race  or 
religion.  They  bury  the  unknown  dead,  carrying  themselves 
the  corpse  to  the  sepulchre.  The  scaffold  even  does  not  repel 
them  from  fulfilling,  in  its  broadest  extent,  the  spirit  of  their 
vows.  They  are  to  be  found  at  the  latest  moment  beside  the 
criminal,  consoling  and  preparing  him  for  his  doom  ;  and,  aft¬ 
er  his  head  has  fallen  under  the  axe  of  the  guillotine,  gather¬ 
ing  up  his  mangled  remains,  to  bestow  upon  them  a  Christian 
burial.  Priest  and  layman,  noble  and  mechanic,  unknown 
perhaps  to  each  other,  and  unrecognizable  by  their  nearest 
relatives,  bear  upon  their  shoulders  the  same  litter,  containing, 
it  may  be,  a  poor  cripple,  abandoned  by  all  the  world  beside. 
Knowing  his  benefactors  only  by  the  uniform  which  proclaims 
them  to  be  ministering  angels  to  suffering  mankind,  he  prays 
to  their  common  Father  alike  for  all.  The  spectator  of  the 
mournful  cortege,  be  he  prince  or  beggar,  respectfully  uncov¬ 
ers  his  head  as  it  silently  passes  along  the  street.  Often,  when 
unknown  hands  have  borne  away  the  head  of  a  family  to  the 
succors  poverty  too  often  denies  to  her  children  under  their 
own  roofs,  or  perhaps  to  his  burial,  the  afflicted  mother  finds 
that  the  same  hands  have  left  behind  them  altos  that  will 
nourish  her  through  her  first  sorrows,  and  linger  forever  in  her 
grateful  memory. 

The  Grand  Duke  is  a  member  of  the  society,  more  in  name 
than  in  action,  though  he  is  said  occasionally  to  assume  the 
habit  and  visit  the  bedside  of  the  dying,  leaving  behind  him  a 
clew  to  his  rank  by  the  extent  of  his  bounty. 

But,  as  with  every  other  creature  of  man,  useful  as  it  un¬ 
doubtedly  is,  and  meriting  the  warmest  eulogiums,  yet  it  is 
not  without  its  evils.  It  was  established  during  a  period  of 
great  public  calamity,  when  human  nature  shrank  affrighted 
from  the  duties  it  was  called  upon  to  perform.  The  ties  of 

blood  had  lost  their  power,  wealth  had  grown  alike  feeble, 

rj 


50 


ITALIAN  SIGHTS  AND  PAPAL  PRINCIPLES. 


while  misery,  disease,  and  despair  rioted  in  their  career  of 
selfishness,  profligacy,  and  death.  Then  religion  intervened, 
and,  with  her  parable  of  the  Samaritan,  rekindled  in  the  heart 
of  humanity  that  ardent  love  of  the  common  neighbor  which 
led  to  the  holiest  rivalry  in  charity,  and  most  touching  self-ab¬ 
negation  the  world  had  as  yet  witnessejd  on  so  comprehensive 
a  scale.  Its  benefits  during  pestilence  are  incalculable,  be¬ 
cause  it  is  during  seasons  when  ordinary  benevolence  fails 
that  its  sublime  energies  take  their  loftiest  flight.  They  lead 
the  forlorn  hope  of  humanity,  and  cheerfully  mount  the  breach 
to  contest  with  death,  in  its  most  appalling  forms,  their  right 
to  save  its  victims.  But  when  the  world  treads  its  usual 
course,  the  ordinary  sentiments  of  human  brotherhood  had 
better  be  left  to  their  natural  action.  Corporations  in  benev¬ 
olence,  as  in  commerce,  tend  to  weaken  individual  responsibil¬ 
ity  or  enterprise.  If  an  accident  occurs,  is  is  rare  indeed  that 
the  sufferer  does  not  find  a  Samaritan  among  the  sympathizing 
crowd,  prompt  to  hind  up  his  wounds.  But,  should  a  brother 
of  the  Misericordia  he  at  hand,  he  anoints  the  victim  with  oil 
from  his  crucifix,  and  thus  seals  him  as  his  own.  The  neigh¬ 
bors,  disburdened  of  the  compassionate  calls  of  their  own 
consciences,  cease  to  interfere,  for  he  is  no  longer  a  waif  upon 
the  shores  of  humanity,  but  a  wreck  in  charge  of  his  spiritual 
and  medicinal  underwriters.  The  brother  hastens  to  give  the 
alarm  to  his  assistants,  hut  it  sometimes  happens  that,  before 
they  have  time  to  don  their  habits  and  arrive  at  the  side  of  the 
sufferer,  he  has  passed  beyond  the  reach  of  their  help.  How¬ 
ever,  these  casualties  are  of  rare  occurrence,  and  it  is  doubtful 
if  any  other  system  of  benevolence  would  he  found  better 
adapted  to  the  wants  of  Tuscany — habituated  as  it  is  to  the 
guidance  of  a  hierarchy  that  forbids  individual  action  and  re¬ 
sponsibility  in  all  matters  of  civil  and  religious  policy — than 
that  practiced  by  this  organized  militia  of  charity. 


ITALIAN  SIGHTS  AND  PAPAL  PRINCIPLES. 


51 


The  Pergola  retains  its  motley  and  brilliant  world  until  near 
midnight,  when  it  scatters  itself  among  the  various  soirees, 
receptions,  and  balls  which  Florence  proffers  with  so  much 
hospitality.  A  singular  feature  of  Florentine  society  is  its  cos¬ 
mopolitan  character.  Elsewhere,  the  native  element  predom¬ 
inates  ;  but  here  it  is  but  one  star  in  the  firmament  of  fash¬ 
ion,  often  eclipsed  by  the  superior  magnitude  of  those  that 
have  wandered  hither  from  foreign  spheres.  Representatives 
of  all  the  nations  of  Europe  here  meet  in  social  rivalry,  each 
striving  to  outshine  the  other,  while  adding  to  the  pleasure  of 
the  whole.  Consequently,  society  furnishes  a  variety,  brill¬ 
iancy,  and  piquancy  not  readily  to  be  found  in  other  cities. 

The  nobles  have  established  a  sort  of  club,  called  the  Casi¬ 
no,  which  possesses  a  fine  suite  of  rooms  in  the  Piazza  Santa 
Trinita.  Any  stranger  properly  recommended  can  become  a 
member,  by  the  payment  of  a  trifling  fee  for  the  benefit  of  the 
servants.  There  is  no  restaurant  or  reading-room,  but  it  affords 
an  agreeable  social  rendezvous,  with  facilities  for  cards  and 
billiards.  It  is  under  the  patronage  of  the  Grand  Duke  ;  and, 
during  the  winter,  balls  are  given.  The  court  generally  at¬ 
tend,  and  the  etiquette  is  of  that  easy  good-breeding  that 
makes  every  one  feel  at  home.  They  form  a  very  agreeable 
addition  to  the  hospitalities  of  Florence. 

The  chief  attractions,  however,  are  the  court  balls  at  the 
Pitti.  The  Grand  Duke,  with  politic  liberality,  throws  open 
his  vast  and  beautiful  salons  frequently,  during  the  fashionable 
season,  to  the  society  of  Florence.  No  billets  of  invitation  are 
issued,  but  notice  is  sent  to  each  foreign  minister  when  the 
bails  are  to  occur,  and  he  notifies  those  of  his  countrymen 
whom  he  judges  suitable  to  be  presented.  Their  names  are 
sent  in  to  the  Grand  Chamberlain.  The  Americans,  having 
no  representative,  are  obliged  to  apply  to  him  personally. 
The  Chevalier  Ginori  is  always  prompt  to  perform  for  those 


52 


ITALIAN  SIGHTS  AND  PAPAL  PRINCIPLES. 


of  respectability  the  service  which  properly  belongs  only  to  a 
representative  of  their  country.  Those  who  have  ever  been 
presented  go  freely  to  all  the  fetes  without  farther  ceremony. 
The  foreigners  or  Florentines,  not  yet  presented,  assemble  at 
nine  o’clock  in  one  of  the  halls,  where  they  await,  with  their 
minister,  the  entrance  of  the  (xrand  Duke.  Each  nation  has  a 
place  apart.  The  Grand  Duke,  reversing  the  usual  awkward 
courtly  etiquette,  which  requires  the  inexperienced  stranger 
to  be  presented  to  the  sovereign,  and  hack  out  from  his  pres¬ 
ence,  walks  round  the  circle,  hearing  the  name  of  each  per¬ 
son,  and  occasionally  stopping  to  make  some  observation. 
The  whole  affair  is  very  quickly  dispatched,  and  the  parties 
hurry  off  to  the  dance,  which  is  kept  up  with  great  animation 
until  about  two  o’clock. 

No  city  in  Europe  surpasses  Florence  in  the  magnificence 
of  its  toilets  (at  least,  so  it  is  said) ;  not  so  much  in  the  dress 
as  in  the  displays  of  ancient  lace  and  jewels.  In  viewing 
the  elite  of  Florentine  aristocracy  on  a  gala  night,  one  would 
suppose  that  each  alone  possessed  the  key  of  Aladdin’s  cave. 
The  balls  of  the  English  and  French  courts  may  be  more 
brilliant  in  their  tout  ensemble,  but,  for  sociability  and  good 
taste,  those  of  the  Grand  Duke  stand  foremost.  The  charm 
of  Italian  society  is  that  it  immediately  melts  all  reserve, 
while  it  retains  a  tone  of  chivalrous  courtesy.  You  are  un¬ 
bent,  in  spite  of  yourself,  when  once  the  presentation  is  pass¬ 
ed.  It  is  really  delightful  to  see  the  easy  familiarity  of  the 
best-bred  Italians  among  themselves.  It  is  not  elaborate,  like 
that  of  Frenchmen,  taking  its  cue  from  the  head,  but  is  a 
genuine  inspiration  of  the  heart.  Personal  freedoms  are  not 
bestowed,  as  among  the  Anglo-Saxon  race,  with  an  emphasis 
that  all  but  upsets  the  recipient,  and  makes  him  as  fearful  of 
meeting  a  “  good  fellow”  as  he  would  a  mad  dog,  but  are 
given  with  all  the  delicacy  and  grace  of  young  girls  Our 


ITALIAN  SIGHTS  AND  PAPAL  PRINCIPLES. 


53 


ways,  to  be  sure,  are  not  like  their  ways,  and  we  rather 
shrink  from  a  whiskered  and  mustached  exquisite,  who,  after 
knowing  us  one  day,  calls  us  by  our  Christian  name,  on  the 
second  “  my  dear,”  and,  upon  meeting  after  a  brief  separation, 
rushes  into  our  arms,  landing  an  affectionate  kiss  plump  on 
our  lips,  hugging  us  in  the  mean  while  with  all  the  ardor  of  a 
just  accepted  lover.  Despite  this  risk,  however,  there  is  about 
them  an  undefinable  courtesy,  which,  without  meaning  or  cost¬ 
ing  much,  or  savoring  even  of  English  “  home”  hospitality, 
fills  up  the  chinks  of  social  intercourse  admirably,  and  makes 
a  smooth  surface  often  out  of  very  unpromising  materials. 
Possessing  lively  imaginations,  quick  perceptions,  and  great 
elasticity  of  spirit,  with  a  natural  taste  for  the  beautiful  in 
whatever  they  study,  they  give  an  Epicurean  relish  to  society 
more  delicately  fiavored  than  the  sparkling  tone  of  France,  so 
like  its  own  Champagne.  They  are  proud,  sensitive,  and  tri¬ 
fling  ;  but,  in  their  anger,  courteous,  and  if  they  waste  time,  it 
is  gracefully  done.  The  more  I  see  of  Italian  character,  the 
higher  the  estimate  I  put  upon  its  moral  and  intellectual  ca¬ 
pacities.  If  it  does  not  correspond  to  our  standard,  charity  re¬ 
quires  us  to  ask  why.  When  we  have  penetrated  the  spell 
that  makes  it  what  it  is,  we  prize  our  own  institutions  the 
more,  and  pray  for  the  time  when  Italy  shall  throw  off  her 
bonds,  and  contest  on  equal  terms  with  the  free  nations  of 
earth  for  that  moral  supremacy  which  alone  constitutes  true 
greatness. 


CHAPTER  III. 


FLORENCE  ARCHITECTURALLY  AND  HISTORICALLY,  WITH 

GLIMPSES  AT  ITS  DEAD  LIONS. 

\ 

Florence  possesses  enough  beautiful  architecture  to  make 
the  reputation  of  a  dozen  American  towns.  This  is  to  be  ex¬ 
pected  of  a  city  where  Giotto,  Arnolfo,  Brunellesco,  Michael 
Angelo,  and  Raphael  were  the  architects,  and  labored  on  both 
jmblic  and  private  edifices.  But,  for  all  this,  Florence,  viewed 
internally,  has,  for  a  European  capital,  a  somewhat  mean  as¬ 
pect.  It  is  too  condensed.  With  few  exceptions,  its  numer¬ 
ous  palaces  and  churches  are  hidden  in  obscure  streets,  with 
seeming  indifference  to  external  effect,  notwithstanding  their 
architectural  merit  and  delicate  ornature.  It  is  difficult  for 
the  eye  to  measure  their  beautiful  proportions  or  to  appreciate 
their  labored  elegance,  because  it  has  not  space  in  which  to 
grasp  their  harmonious  unity. 

The  taste  for  narrow,  dark  streets,  with  eaves  so  projecting 
as  greatly  to  interefere  with  the  free  passage  of  light,  has  not 
even  yet  been  wholly  superseded  by  the  modern  love  for  more 
wholesome  and  cheerful  neighborhoods.  The  old  lords  were 
satisfied  to  find  a  foundation  sufficiently  firm  and  ample  for 
their  massive  habitations.  The  present  nobles  live  where 
their  fathers  did,  or,  if  they  build,  are  much  inclined  to  imitate 
them.  Thus  the  villas  Poniatowski  and  Borghese,  both  mod¬ 
ern,  occupy  situations  which  no  one  of  America’s  “  upper  ten 
thousand”  could  stomach  for  a  day.  Then,  too,  a  goodly  por¬ 
tion  of  the  palaces  in  general  is  devoted  to  the  baser  uses  of 


ITATJAN  SIGHTS  AND  PAPAL  PRINCIPLES 


o5 


trade.  Even  the  oldest  names  do  not  hesitate  to  retail  wine 
from  their  cellars  through  a  little  iron  trap-door  to  any  one 
who  knocks  thereon.  This  is,  however,  a  time-honored  pa¬ 
trician  practice,  and  sanctioned  by  classical  usage,  for  the  old 
Roman  lords  did  the  same. 

The  general  dispersion  of  the  mansions  of  the  nobility 
throughout  the  town  is  not  without  beneficial  results.  It  pre¬ 
vents  the  isolation  of  the  rich  and  poor  into  distinct  quarters, 
and  makes  them  better  acquainted.  If  the  grand  effect  of 
palaces  is  somewhat  diminished  by  indiscriminate  herding 
with  meaner  edifices,  the  general  appearance  of  the  place  is 
improved.  Hence,  although  we  may  find  many  incongruous 
spectacles  in  the  neighborhood,  and  sometimes  about  even 
aristocratic  mansions,  such  as  stables  and  mechanics’  shops 
beneath,  vegetable  and  meat  stalls  against  their  walls,  and 
more  filthy  sights  and  smells  at  their  base,  or  awkward  fes¬ 
toons  of  family  linen  suspended  from  the  chamber  windows  to 
dry,  yet  there  is  a  very  welcome  absence  of  those  squalid 
abodes  of  filth  and  poverty  which  distinguish  certain  quarters 
of  more  democratic  cities. 

The  most  characteristic  specimen  of  that  species  of  archi- 
teeture  which  gives  to  Florence  so  anomalous  an  aspect  is  the 
Pitti  Palace.  The  front  is  usually  regarded  as  the  back,  and, 
at  first  glance,  from  the  immense  size  of  the  rough-hewn 
stones,  its  apparent  simplicity,  and  vast  extent,  it  upsets  all 
one’s  previous  conceptions  of  a  regal  residence.  But  farther 
and  closer  inspection  convinces  one  of  its  architectural  superi¬ 
ority  over  most  of  the  lighter  and  more  fanciful  palaces  we 
find  elsewhere.  It  has  about  it  the  imposing  aspect  and 
strength  of  an  aristoeratic  residence,  yet  it  would  equally  befit 
the  governmental  wants  of  a  republic.  Solid  and  graceful,  in 
its  harmonious  combination  of  strength  and  beauty,  it  is  not 
excelled,  in  these  respects,  by  any  other  ro5%al  residence  in 


56 


ITALIAN  SIGHTS  AND  PAPAL  PRINCIPLES. 


Europe.  It  was  commenced  in  1440,  by  Brunellesco,  for  Luca 
Pitti,  an  enemy  of  the  Medici,  desirous  of  eclipsing  their  wealth 
and  power  by  giving  an  imposing  token  of  his  own.  He 


wished  also  to  build  a  palace  on  so  capacious  a  scale  that  the 
court-yard  alone  should  be  able  to  contain  the  entire  palace 


ITALIAN  SIGHTS  AND  PAPAL  PRINCIPLES. 


67 


of  his  rival  Strozzi.  He  finished  by  ruining  himself,  and  his 
palace  passed  into  the  possession  of  his  enemies.  By  them  it 
was  completed  as  we  find  it,  though  the  family  were  nearly 


two  centuries  about  the  work.  The  side  toward  the  garden 
is  a  very  striking  contrast  to  the  other,  possessing  the  same 


C 


58 


ITALIAN  SIGHTS  AND  PAPAL  PRINCIPLES. 


elements  of  solidity,  but  so  arranged  as  to  be  in  unison  with 
the  smiling  vista  of  flowers,  groves,  and  statues  beyond.  A 
stranger,  seeing  one  side  only  of  this  building,  would  go  away 
with  as  obstinate  and  false  an  idea  of  its  tout  ensemble  as  did 
the  knights  of  the  ancient  legend  who  looked  only  on  the  sil¬ 
ver  or  gold  surface  of  the  shield  toward  them,  and  be  as  fully 
inclined  to  battle  to  the  death  for  his  but  half-formed  opinion. 

The  peculiar  situation  of  Florence,  in  the  hollow  of  many 
hills,  with  its  bisecting  river  running  seaward  through  a  rich 
plain,  hemmed  in  by  picturesque  ranges  of  the  Ajjennines,  and 
studded  as  thickly  with  white  villas  as  are  the  heavens  of  a 
clear  night  with  stars,  makes  its  first  view,  from  whichsoever 
side  it  is  approached,  novel  and  charming.  Come  upon  it  how 
and  where  we  may,  whether  from  the  distant  mountain,  the 
overhanging  hill,  or  the  verdant  plain,  the  impression  of  its 
beauty  is  equally  vivid.  It  has  as  many  aspects  as  a  kalei¬ 
doscope,  and  it  would  be  a  nice  point  to  settle  upon  the  best. 
If  there  be  any  fault  to  be  found  with  the  general  landscape 
about  Florence,  it  would  be  that  it  is  overcharged  with  art. 
Nature  appears  only  under  cultivation.  The  geology  of  the 
soil  is  seen  chiefly  in  the  structures  that  man  has  reared.  The 
very  surface-rock  is  exhausted  or  covered  with  vineyards, 
while  the  agriculturist’s  hand  leaves  no  spot  of  ground  un¬ 
touched.  The  forest  trees  have  a  garden-look.  The  roads 
are  narrow,  tortuous,  and  confined  by  high  stone  walls.  In¬ 
dustry  stops  only  before  the  sterile  or  precipitous  mountain 
summits  which  make  either  horizon  of  the  valley.  In  short, 
the  suburbs  are  like  the  expanded  blossom,  while  the  city  re¬ 
sembles  the  shrunken  seed-pod. 

It  is  no  easy  matter  for  Florence  to  stretch  herself  out  to 
modern  notions  of  comfort.  Her  efforts  at  widening  her  streets 
remind  one  of  the  yawns  of  a  dozing  giant.  Houses  which 
are  as  solid  as  the  quarry  itself  are  not  to  be  trimmed  or 


ITALIAN  SIGHTS  AND  PAPAL  PRINCIPLES 


50 


moved  oft'like  the  frail  structures  of  America.  They  were  built 
to  last,  not  years,  hut  centuries,  and  they  are  fully  determined 
on  completing  their  destiny.  Still  something  has  been  done, 
and  modern  Florentines  begin  to  have  a  faint  idea  that  there 
exists  sunlight  somewhere  in  the  region  above  them.  Within 
a  few  years,  the  principal  business  street  of  the  city,  leading 
from  the  Cathedral  Square  to  the  Place  of  the  Grand  Duke, 
has  been  remodeled  into  a  fine  wide  avenue,  which  would  do 
credit  to  Paris.  Formerly  it  was  so  narrow  that  carriages 
could  not  pass  each  other.  Yet  a  modern  English  author  la¬ 
ments  the  change,  while  so  many  churches  remain  unfinished, 
as  if  the  completion  of  a  facade  was  to  human  beings  a  con¬ 
sideration  of  more  importance  than  a  supply  of  the  pure  air  of 
heaven.  Of  late,  we  have  had  an  abundant  crop  of  those  ama¬ 
teurs  of  good  old  times,  who  would  fain  persuade  the  people 
that  when  they  herded  like  swine,  fought  their  lord’s  quarrels, 
and  begged  at  convent  gates,  they  were  better  off  than  with  the 
comforts  of  the  nineteenth  century  about  them.  They  may  be 
willing  to  replace  the  cottage  by  the  hovel,  the  model  lodging- 
house  by  the  damp  and  unwholesome  habitations  of  the  Middle 
Ages,  that  the  cathedral  and  palace  may  be  built  to  gratify  their 
architectural  taste  ;  but  we  doubt  if  one  of  them  would  consent 
to  reduce  his  own  household  standard  to  the  level  of  the  Eliz¬ 
abethan  age,  exchanging  his  Champagne  for  coarse  beer,  and 
his  Brussels  carpets  for  dirty  rushes,  however  much  he  may 
prate  about  the  petrifying  influence  of  modern  sensuality,  as 
shown  in  the  luxury  of  boudoirs  and  pride  of  reception-rooms. 

The  oldest  monument  of  Florence  is  the  Baptistery  of  St. 
John,  the  primitive  church  of  the  city,  dating  its  consecration 
to  Christ  from  the  sixth  century,  but  having,  at  least  in  part,  a 
prior  origin  as  a  heathen  temple.  This  we  should  consider  a 
very  respectable  antiquity  were  Pvorne  not  so  near.  Ancient 
art  and  architects  worked  slowly,  so  it  was  not  until  six  cen- 


60 


ITALIAN  SIGHTS  AND  PAPAL  PRINCIPLES. 


turies  later  that  it  was  completed  as  we  now  find  it.  The 
(xreek  artists  of  the  ninth  century,  dispersed  from  Constantino¬ 
ple,  left  traces  of  their  tastes  for  mosaics  every  where.  It  is 
to  them  that  the  Baptistery  is  indebted  for  its  long  and  meagre 
figures  of  Christ,  the  Virgin,  and  the  Saints  in  a  sea  of  gold. 
But  to  me  its  most  interesting  feature  is  that  it  perpetuates  the 
memory  of  a  generosity  worthy  of  a  Christian  monument  like 
this.  While  it  exists  it  will  rebuke  the  spirit  of  unworthy 
jealousy  among  artists,  and  long  after  its  destruction  the  mem¬ 
ory  of  the  disinterestedness  it  consecrated  will,  it  is  to  be  hoped, 
continue  to  find  an  abiding  place  in  the  hearts  of  men. 

In  1330,  Andrew  of  Pisa  was  charged  with  the  execution  of 
the  southern  gate  of  bronze.  He  completed  his  labor  in  1339. 
It  produced  so  great  a  sensation  from  its  beauty,  that  the  gov¬ 
ernment  of  Florence,  with  the  foreign  embassadors,  went  in  sol¬ 
emn  state  to  visit  it,  at  the  same  time  conferring  upon  Andrew 
the  honors  of  citizenship. 

There  were  two  more  gates  required  to  complete  the  edifice. 
It  was  resolved  to  offer  them  to  the  competition  of  artists  of 
all  nations,  in  the  hope  that  something  might  be  realized  which 
should  correspond  with  the  beauty  of  the  work  of  the  first. 
Each  artist  who  received  the  commission  was  to  receive  also 
from  the  republic  a  sum  sufficient  for  his  subsistence  for  a 
year,  at  the  expiration  of  which  time  he  was  to  present  his  de¬ 
sign  Among  the  artists  that  offered  themselves  were  Dona¬ 
tello,  Lorenzo  de  Bartoluccio,  Simon  de  Bolle,  Brunellesco,  and 
other  celebrated  names  of  that  era.  These  were  all  admitted 
to  the  contest  without  objection.  There  came  also  a  young 
man  named  Lorenzo  Ghiberti,  an  itinerant  goldsmith  and 
carver,  who  had  been  encouraged  to  present  himself  by  the 
Lord  of  Rimihi.  The  judges  asked  him  what  he  had  done. 
This  was  a  difficult  question  for  him  to  answer,  for  as  yet  he 
had  modeled  only  pretty  playthings  in  wnx  and  clay  for  the 


ITALIAN  SIGHTS  AND  PAPAL  PRINCIPLES. 


G1 


children  of  his  patron,  (fhiherti,  discouraged  by  the  severity 
of  the  judges,  was  upon  the  point  of  abandoning  his  project 
and  returning  to  Himini,  to  work  upon  the  frescoes  ordered  of 
him  by  Malatesta,  its  tyrant,  as  it  was  the  fashion  then  to  call 
the  petty  lords,  when  one  of  his  competitors,  interested  by  his 
youth  and  energy,  interceded  for  him.  He  was  received,  more 
to  encourage  his  ambition  than  in  the  belief  of  his  becoming  a 
rival.  This  was,  however,  all  he  desired.  The  money  was 
handed  him  for  his  year’s  expenses,  and  he  devoted  himself 
to  the  task. 

At  the  expiration  of  the  year,  the  thirty-four  judges,  all  first 
rate  artists,  assembled  to  decide  upon  the  designs  of  the  claim¬ 
ants. 

Donatello,  Lorenzo  de  Bartoluccio,  and  Brunellesco  equally 
divided  their  suffrages.  On  which  of  the  three  the  work  should 
have  been  bestowed,  would  perhaps  have  proved  to  the  judges 
as  difficult  of  solution  as  to  unravel  the  Gordian  knot,  and  per¬ 
haps  they  would  have  been  obliged  to  decide  the  question  on 
the  same  principle  of  division,  had  not  these  three  artists  solved 
the  problem  for  them.  The  sketch  of  Ghiberti  lay  there  be¬ 
side  their  own.  It  had  been  pronounced  very  beautiful,  but 
not  worthy  of  competition  with  theirs.  Retiring  into  a  corner, 
the  three  conversed  earnestly  together  for  a  few  minutes. 
Their  course  was  soon  taken.  Coming  forward,  they  respect¬ 
fully  represented  to  the  judges  that,  in  justice  to  art,  they  could 
not  receive  the  prize  while  a  design  like  that  of  Ghiberti’s  was 
before  them.  Upon  their  honor  and  conscience,  his  was  the 
superior,  and  to  him  rightly  belonged  the  award.  The  judges, 
already  favorably  impressed,  were  readily  persuaded  by  such 
disinterested  testimony,  and  to  Lorenzo  Ghiberti,  owing  to  the 
unparalleled  generosity  of  his  rivals,  was  decreed  the  execu¬ 
tion  of  the  gates.  Art  could  not  fall  to  prosper  when  genius 
Avas  guided  solely  by  justice. 


62 


ITALIAN  SIGHTS  AND  PAPAL  PRINCIPLES. 


.Ghiberti  worked  forty  years  on  his  task,  commencing  it  in 
his  youth,  and  finishing  it  when  he  was  old  and  bent.  His 
own  portrait,  as  he  completed  his  work,  was  incorporated  by 
him  in  an  ornament  in  the  middle.  It  cost  him  a  lifetime,  but 
it  rewarded  him  with  a  fame  more  durable  even  than  his  own 
doors  of  bronze,  which  Michael  Angelo  pronounced  worthy  to 
be  the  gates  of  Paradise. 

Opposite  these  gates  we  find  a  m6nument  of  a  grace  so  re¬ 
markable  that  even  in  Florence  its  comeliness  has  passed  into 
a  proverb.  “  Beautiful  as  the  Campanile”  is  the  term  employ¬ 
ed  when  all  other  comparisons  of  splendor  fail  to  a  Floren¬ 
tine.  It  unites  all  the  delicacy  of  finish  of  the  richest  lace- 
work  with  the  solidity  of  stone.  Time  has  mellowed  the  orig¬ 
inal  brightness  of  its  varied  marbles  into  a  pale  gold  tint,  leav¬ 
ing,  however,  perfectly  distinguishable  its  checkered  mosaics, 
which  rival  in  delicacy  the  finest  work  of  Hindostan.  The 
Emperor  Charles  V.  best  described  its  marvelous  beauty  when 
he  declared  that  it  should  be  put  under  glass,  and  shown  only 
on  holidays.  It  is  seemingly  too  fair  and  delicate  to  with¬ 
stand  any  climate,  however  delicious,  yet  centuries,  as  they 
roll  by,  thus  far  have  served  but  to  deepen  its  beauties,  with¬ 
out  detracting  from  its  perfect  lightness  and  freshness  of  de¬ 
sign. 

The  Campanile  is  the  bell-tower  of  the  Duomo,  which  it  ad¬ 
joins.  The  same  style  of  decoration  has  been  employed  in 
the  exterior  of  this  immense  building,  which,  like  a  lion  couch- 
ant,  lies  spread  out  on  the  Piazza  to  which  it  gives  a  name. 
The  dome — finished  by  Brunellesco  in  1436 — is  the  largest  in 
the  world.  It  served  as  the  model  for  that  of  St.  Peter’s  to 
Michael  Angelo,  who,  despairing  of  excelling,  hoped  only  to 
rival  it,  and  desired  that  his  tomb  should  be  so  placed  that  ho 
might  continue  to  gaze  upon  it  even  in  death.  “Farewell,” 
he  exclaimed,  when  called  to  Rome  by  Julius  II.,  to  complete 


3TALIAN  SIGHTS  AND  PAPAL  PRINCIPLES 


C3 


THE  CAMPANILE 


St.  Peter’s  ;  “  I  go  to  try  to  make  thy  sister,  hut  I  can  not  hope 
to  make  thy  equal.” 

When  the  Florentine  Republic,  in  1298,  designed  the  exe¬ 
cution  of  this  magnificent  work,  they  decreed  as  follows  : 
“  Whereas,  the  chief  aim  of  a  people  of  great  origin  being  to 


Cl  ITALIAN  SIGHTS  AND  PAPAL  PRINCIPLES. 


act  in  a  way  that,  from  its  outward  works,  every  one  should 
recognize  both  its  wise  and  magnanimous  manner  of  proeeed- 
ing,  we  order  Arnolfo,  chief  architect  of  our  city,  to  make  a 
model  or  design  for  the  complete  rebuilding  of  St.  Reparata, 
with  the  greatest  possible  magnificence  that  the  human  mind 
is  eapable  of  conceiving,  since  it  has  been  decreed  in  council, 
both  public  and  private,  by  the  most  able  men  of  this  city,  that 
nothing  should  be  undertaken  for  the  community  which  did 
not  correspond  entirely  to  the  ideas  of  its  most  enlightened  cit¬ 
izens,  united  together  to  decide  on  such  subjects,  and  moved 
by  one  and  the  same  mind,  the  grandeur  and  glory  of  the  coun¬ 
try.”  This  formula  is  worthy  of  being  transplanted  to  trans¬ 
atlantic  shores  as  a  legacy  to  the  sovereign  people  of  the  New 
World,  from  the  shades  of  the  departed  republicans  of  the  old. 

The  Duomo,  or  Cathedral,  also  called  “  Holy  Mary  of  the 
Flowers,”  fully  corresponds  to  the  spirit  of  the  document,  with 
the  exception  that  six  centuries  have  not  sufficed  to  furnish  it 
with  a  facade,  or  complete  some  of  the  minor  portions  of  the 
dome  and  the  exterior  gallery.  It  is,  however,  a  truly  mag¬ 
nificent  monument  of  the  taste  and  piety  of  the  citizens  of  the 
old  republic,  whether  we  take  in  at  one  glance  its  colossal  di¬ 
mensions,  doubled  in  size  under  the  magic  effect  of  moonlight, 
with  its  vast  dome  rising  between  us  and  the  heavens,  like  a 
newly-created  satellite  for  the  earth,  or,  by  the  strong  light  of 
day,  bewilder  the  eye  in  the  vain  effort  to  comprise  into  one 
look  its  interminable  and  delicate  tracery.  The  exterior  is  as 
highly  finished  as  the  Campanile,  and  quite  as  worthy  of  a 
glass  case.  The  interior  is  an  anomaly  among  Roman  Catho¬ 
lic  churches  of  Italy  for  its  severe  and  grand  simplicity.  It 
pleases  me  the  more  that  I  find  it  a  church,  and  not  a  museum. 
It  is  the  noblest  specimen  extant  of  the  Tuscan  Gothic ;  per¬ 
haps  a  little  too  cold,  but  great  and  consistent  throughout  in 
its  proportions  and  decorations. 


# 


ITALIAN  SIGHTS  AND  PAPAL  PRINCIPLES 


65 


Singularly  enough,  the  Duomo  contains  the  monument  of  a 


notorious  heretic  and  mercenary  soldier,  who  owed  his  employ¬ 
ment  and  honors  from  the  Florentine  Republic  to  his  success 
in  fighting  against  it.  This  was  John  Hawkwood,  an  English¬ 
man,  the  general  of  the  celebrated  Black  Bands  that,  in  the 


36 


ITALIAN  SIGHTS  AND  PAPAL  PRINCIPLES. 


fourteenth  century,  sold  their  swords  to  the  highest  bidders. 
John  Hawkwood  passed  from  the  service  of  the  Holy  Father 
at  Rome,  the  vicegerent  of  the  Prince  of  Peace,  into  that  of  the 
Florentines,  whom  he  served  for  twenty  years.  So  stoutly  did 
he  battle  for  them,  that  the  Church  admitted  him  to  honors 
next  to  saintship  ;  but  not  for  his  piety,  for  he  was  a  sad  rep¬ 
robate  and  brutal  soldier,  with  but  a  faint  respect  for  the  min¬ 
isters  of  religion. 

At  the  sack  of  Faenza,  which  he  abandoned  to  his  troops,  he 
found  two  of  his  bravest  officers  fighting  for  the  possession  of 
a  poor  nun,  clinging,  in  her  terror,  to  the  crucifix  of  the  high 
altar  of  the  convent.  Hawkwood  promptly  restored  discipline 
by  stabbing  to  the  heart  the  guiltless  cause  of  the  affiray. 

One  day  two  monks  paid  him  a  visit  at  his  chateau  of  Mon- 
tecchio.  “  The  peace  of  God  rest  upon  you,”  said  one  of  them 
to  him.  “  The  devil  take  you,  with  your  gift,”  bluntly  replied 
Hawkwood.  “Why  do  you  give  us  so  rude  a  reception?” 
meekly  asked  the  poor  brother.  “  Eh  !”  he  rejoined,  with  the 
usual  profane  exclamation  of  the  English  race,  “  do  you  not 
know  that  I  live  by  war,  and  that  the  peace  that  you  wish  me 
would  make  me  starve  ?”  It  is  easy  to  conceive  that  it  must 
have  been  by  other  acts  than  these  that  he  won  the  favor  of 
the  Church. 

At  the  rear  of  the  high  altar  we  find  the  last  work  on  which 
Michael  Angelo  labored.  It  represents  Joseph  of  Arimathea 
taking  the  body  of  Christ  from  the  cross,  and  was  destined 
by  the  sculptor  for  his  own  tomb.  Death  did  not  give  him 
time  to  finish  it,  and  the  unscrupulous  chanonines  of  the  Cathe¬ 
dral,  in  their  pious  zeal  for  the  adornment  of  their  church,  so 
it  is  said,  seized  the  unfinished  block  of  marble  for  their  high 
altar,  and  thus  robbed  the  great  artist  of  what  would  have 
been  his  most  appropriate  monument. 

The  power  of  genius  to  make  every  thing  it  touches  its  own 


ITALIAN  SIGHTS  AND  PAPAL  PRINCIPLES. 


67 


was  never  more  fully  exemplified  than  by  the  effect  of  Michael 
Angelo’s  name  upon  this  city.  Florence  seems  to  belong  to 
him,  and  not  he  to  Florence.  There  is  a  touching  familiarity, 
too,  in  the  associations  that  speak  of  the  heart,  as  if  Florence 
loved  as  well  as  honored  its  great  master.  And  yet  there  was 
in  him  more  of  the  prophet  Moses  than  the  apostle  John. 


68 


ITALIAN  SIGHTS  AND  PAPAL  PRINCIPLES. 


Buildings  which  in  themselves  have  a  just  claim  to  fame,  are 
wider  known  from  his  opinions  than  from  their  own  merits ; 
and  travelers  visit  their  shrines,  not  to  criticise  them,  but  to 
admire  what  Michael  Angelo  praised.  He  was  wont  to  call 
the  stately  church  of  Santa  Maria  Novella — beautiful  without, 
and  full  of  good  things  within — his  wife ;  and  that  of  San 


ITALIAN  SIGHTS  AND  PAPAL  PRINCIPLES. 


69 


Miniato  upon  the  Hill,  as  charming  and  picturesque  a  little 
chapel,  both  in  situation  and  decoration,  as  can  be  found  any 
where,  his  rustic  sweetheart.  The  first — like  a  good,  honest 
mother  of  a  family — still  retains  those  qualities  that  made  her 
dear  to  his  soul ;  while  the  rural  San  Miniato,  lovely  as  ever 
in  its  position,  has  faded  like  a  superannuated  belle,  and  is  now 
visited  only  from  the  reputation  of  those  charms  that  once  won 
the  love  of  the  stern  and  captious  architect.  It  is  deserted 
even  by  the  clergy.  A  peasant  woman  retains  the  key  of  the 
inclosure,  and  the  stone  mistress  of  Michael  Angelo  is  now  ex¬ 
hibited  by  an  old  crone,  but  too  content  to  receive  the  small¬ 
est  gratuity. 

The  imagination  has  almost  as  much  to  do  with  the  reputa¬ 
tion  of  Michael  Angelo  as  with  his  works,  in  giving  both  that 
character  of  sublimity  and  grandiose  effect  which  was  evident¬ 
ly  his  aim,  and  for  which  he  frequently  sacrificed  the  nicer  de¬ 
tails  of  truth.  In  statuary,  he  seems  to  me  to  strive  after  some 
unattainable  end,  as  if  his  conceptions  overpowered  his  means 
of  execution.  We  detect  at  once  the  force  and  depth  of  his 
imagination.  The  spiritual  truths  he  would  convey  start  out 
from  the  very  stone,  with  all  the  energy  of  form  and  character 
with  which  they  sprang  into  life  from  his  teeming  brain.  This 
is  particularly  true  of  his  unfinished  works,  which  furnish  the 
hint,  and  leave  to  the  beholder’s  mind  to  complete  the  idea, 
with  a  perfection  of  moral  and  artistic  attributes  that  the  chisel 
would  vainly  strive  to  express.  It  is  thus  that  Michael  An¬ 
gelo,  by  creating  the  motive,  incites  to  thought.  By  his  won¬ 
derful  grasp  of  genius,  coupled  with  an  intensity  of  imagina¬ 
tion  seldom  equaled,  creating,  as  it  were  at  will,  ideas  too  vast 
and  comprehensive  to  find  a  birth-place  in  any  minds  whose 
fires  were  not  lighted  direct  from  heaven,  but  which,  when 
flung,  as  it  were,  into  existence  by  the  hot  haste  of  an  energy 
too  impatient  to  polish  them  into  the  perfection  of  material 


70 


ITALIAN  SIGHTS  AND  PAPAL  PRINCIPLES. 


shape  and  beauty,  startle  and  amaze  by  their  deep  truth,  he 
triumphs  over  the  ordinary  understandings  of  men.  But  when 
he  condescends  to  work  at  details,  we  find  he  approaches  the 
more  common  standard  of  art.  The  best  (Grecian  sculptors  ex¬ 
celled  him  in  anatomical  truth.  He  is  inferior  even  to  the 
Apollo  and  Venus,  which  with  connoisseurs  rank  as  antiques 
of  the  second  class.  The  perfect  symmetry  and  delicate  finish 
of  our  own  Powers  are  equally  remote  from  his  chisel.  He 
exaggerated  the  merely  physical,  until,  as  in  his  Moses,  it 
reached  the  unnatural,  and  even  impossible.  The  Prophet  of 
the  Jews,  in  his  hands,  it  is  true,  attained  a  terrific  grandeur  ; 
but  in  divesting  him  of  the  natural  features  of  man,  he  did  not 
exalt  him  to  a  god.  It  is  the  head  of  a  ferocious  satyr,  horns 
and  all,  and  not  that  of  an  inspired  legislator.  No  such 
countenance  as  his  could  have  looked  upon  the  Almighty  and 
lived.  The  sculptors  of  antiquity  never  conceived  a  type  of 
evil  more  repulsive.  An  image  of  brutal  appetites,  furious 
passions,  and  colossal  dimensions,  with  the  vulgar  expression 
of  majesty  that  springs  from  the  merely  physically  great  and 
pre-eminently  bad,  he  has  indeed  created ;  but  the  lawgiver 
of  the  chosen  tribes — he  who  conversed  face  to  face  with  God 
as  with  a  friend,  until  his  features  shone  with  the  glory  of 
heaven — no  Christian  mind  can  recognize  in  the  Moses  of 
Michael  Angelo. 

In  the  muscular  developments  of  his  women  he  partakes  of 
the  coarse  taste  of  Rubens,  as  may  be  seen  in  his  bronzes  in 
the  Louvre  and  statues  in  the  Chapel  of  the  Medici.  We  look 
in  vain  for  the  softness  and  harmony  of  outline  most  attract¬ 
ive  in  the  daughters  of  Eve.  His  women  are  fit  only  to  mate 
with  Titans.  The  anatomy  of  his  men  is  equally  overdone  ; 
but  the  marble,  nevertheless,  is  so  inspired  with  the  lofty  con¬ 
ceptions  of  its  sculptor,  that  the  first  sensation  of  physical 
coarseness  is  quickly  forgotten  in  admiration  of  the  power  of 


ITALIAN  SIGHTS  AND  PAPAL  PRINCIPLES, 


71 


his  creative  mind.  In  no  example  of  chiseling  sentiment  from 
stone  has  he  been  more  successful  than  in  his  Bacchus,  in  the 
Uffizii.  He  has  labored  painfully,  but  successfully,  in  polish¬ 
ing  his  marble  to  the  smoothness  of  the  natural  skin,  over¬ 
coming,  as  if  by  a  strong  effort,  his  predilection  for  the  colos¬ 
sal  to  produce  to  the  world  a  statue  whose  lightness  of  limbs, 
and  life-like  size  and  attitude,  shall  remain  through  all  time  a 
convincing  proof  of  his  ability  to  cope,  in  their  own  range  of 
art,  with  the  master  sculptors  of  Greece.  But  the  wondrous 
skill  of  this  statue  lies  not  so  much  in  the  drunken  lassitude 
of  its  limbs,  swelled  with  the  inebriating  juice  just  drained 
from  the  bowl,  as  in  the  perfect  expression  of  joyous  intoxica¬ 
tion  which  gleams  upon  features  verging  toward  sottish  drunk¬ 
enness.  Intellectual  beauty  and  physical  grace  have  not 
wholly  departed.  Enough  remains  to  show  the  perfection  of 
the  sober  man,  while  the  senses,  just  sinking  in  the  cup,  are 
struggling  in  their  last  gasp,  but  so  faintly  that  they  make  no 
noise,  for  they  feel  themselves  to  be  hopelessly  gone.  Rare 
statue,  this — a  Father  Mathew  in  marble  !  for  I  know  not  any 
living  apostle  of  temperance  who  discourses  more  eloquently, 
or  argues  more  logically,  than  this  silent  stone.  Every  spec¬ 
tator  must  feel  that  drunkenness  is  disgusting  and  brutal  even 
in  its  most  poetical  aspect. 

The  admirers  of  Michael  Angelo,  in  their  enthusiasm  for 
his  genius,  have  long  claimed  for  him  the  habit  of  working 
straightforward  from  the  block — smiting  the  stone,  as  it  were, 
into  shape,  under  the  impulse  of  the  idea  graven  on  his  mind. 
In  some  instances  he  may  have  attempted  this,  which  would 
account  for  so  many  crude  works  from  his  chisel.  Lately,  how¬ 
ever,  accident  has  brought  to  light  many  curious  studies  of 
statues  and  models  in  wax  which  belonged  to  Michael  Angelo, 
and  prove  that  even  his  genius  was  subjected  to  the  universal 
law  of  laborious  detail,  where  the  end  sought  was  perfection. 


72 


ITALIAN  SIGHTS  AND  PAPAL  PRINCIPLES. 


His  last  will  was  characteristic  of  the  man — a  model  of 
brevity,  but  a  bone  of  contention  among  his  heirs,  if  they  were 
at  all  inclined  to  be  avaricious.  ^^Lascio  Vanima  a  Dio,  e  la 
mia  roba  ai  piil  prossimi  parentis  “  I  leave  my  soul  to  God, 
and  my  property  to  my  nearest  relations.”  His  descendants 
— one  of  whom  is  a  painter,  and  professor  in  the  Florentine 
Academy — still  occupy  the  Buonarotti  mansion,  where  they 
preserve,  with  religious  veneration,  many  relics  of  their  distin¬ 
guished  ancestor. 

There  is  a  monument  in  Florence — a  simple  slab  of  marble, 
reposing  under  the  shadow  of  its  magnificent  Cathedral — 
which  interests  me  far  more  than  its  mighty  dome  or  other 
chejs-d'ceuvre  of  its  material  art.  It  recalls  something  more 
than  the  memory  of  those  that  will  to  themselves  glory  by 
earthly  fanes,  limiting  their  grasp  to  this  sphere,  which,  if  it 
be  the  foundation,  is  equally  the  grave  of  their  triumphs  ;  for 
it  links  itself  with  the  mind  of  him  who,  though  born  of  earth, 
measured  heaven  and  hell  in  his  philosophic  glance  ;  the  poet, 
patriot,  and  theologian,  whose  genius  has  spread  itself  wher¬ 
ever  human  language  is  heard,  and  there  is  soul  to  feel  or 
thought  to  comprehend ;  building  himself  a  memorial  in  the 
grand  temple  of  universal  humanity,  which  will  claim  him  for 
its  apostle  and  prophet  through  all  ages.  This  monument,  so 
simple  in  itself,  so  grand  in  its  associations,  is  the  stone  on 
which  Dante  was  accustomed  to  sit,  during  warm  summer 
evenings,  to  catch  the  cooling  breeze. 

The  historical  souvenirs  of  Florence  cluster  thickest  about 
the  Piazza  del  Gran  Duca.  From  whichsoever  point  the  city 
is  viewed  at  a  distance,  there  are  two  objects,  rising  far  above 
all  others,  that  form  its  most  characteristic  and  conspicuous 
landmarks.  These  are  the  dome  of  the  Cathedral,  profoundly 
grand,  like  the  faith  that  gave  it  existence,  and  the  stern,  lofty 
tower  of  the  Palazzo  Vecchio,  lifted  toward  the  skies  like  the 


ITALIAN  SIGHTS  AND  PAPAL  PRINCIPLES.  73 


defying  arm  of  a  giant.  To  view  the  last  in  its  most  com¬ 
manding  aspect,  we  should  enter  the  square  by  the  street  lead¬ 
ing  to  the  Post-office,  and  directly  fronting  the  old  palace. 


Then  this  huge  but  harmonious  mass  of  stonework,  so  firmly 
rooted  to  the  soil,  and  mounting  so  high  toward  heaven,  with 

D 


74 


ITALIAN  SIGHTS  AND  PAPAL  PRINCIPLES. 


its  emblazoned  arms  of  the  deceased  republic,  and  its  giant 
statues,  fit  guardians  of  its  gloomy  portal,  calls  up  vividly  from 
out  the  past  the  turbulent,  but  great  and  free,  associations  of 
democratic  Florence  ;  its  endless  animosities  of  Gruelph  and 
Ghibelline  ;  its  haughty  aristocracy,  and  fierce  population  ; 
the  incorporated  crafts  and  mercenary  soldiery ;  its  spasmodic 
changes  from  the  rule  of  the  people  to  the  tyranny  of  princes, 
until  the  old  square  is  alive  again  with  the  clang  of  mailed 
men,  the  rivalries  of  artists,  intrigues  of  politicians,  and  the 
shouts  of  its  mercurial  population. 

In  1298,  scarcely  sixteen  years  after  the  Florentines  had 
won  for  themselves  a  Constitution,  they  decided  to  build  a 
Cit}’^  Hall  to  accommodate  their  magistrates,  and  also  to  sup¬ 
port  a  belfry  which  should  be  conspicuous  throughout  the 
surrounding  country,  and  give  the  signal  for  the  rallying  of  its 
democracy.  Arnolfo  di  Sapo  was  ordered  to  build  the  palace, 
but  forbidden  to  place  a  single  stone  of  its  foundation  upon 
the  earth  that  had  sustained  any  portion  of  the  house  of  Fari- 
nata  di  XJberti,  which  the  people,  in  their  hatred  of  all  that 
bore  the  name  of  Ghibelline,  had  razed  to  the  very  dust. 
The  architect,  in  consequence,  was  compelled  to  crowd  this 
palace  of  the  people  into  an  irregular,  though  vast  pile,  leav¬ 
ing  the  place  accursed  by  them  to  be  forever  trodden  under 
their  feet,  in  token  of  their  vengeance. 

During  the  republic,  this  palace  lodged  the  chief  magistrate, 
or  Gonfalonier,  with  his  eight  priors,  or  assistants,  two  of  whom 
had  charge  of  each  of  the  four  quarters  of  the  town.  Their 
duties  lasted  two  months,  during  which  time  they  were  com¬ 
pelled  to  devote  themselves  wholly  to  the  service  of  the  re¬ 
public,  not  being  allowed  to  leave  the  palace,  and  receiving 
the  moderate  salary  of  less  than  one  dollar  and  a  half  per  day. 
Although  at  the  head  of  the  republic,  they  were  its  prisoners, 
or  at  best  but  apprenticed  servants,  and  not  allowed  any  por- 


ITALIAN  SIGHTS  AND  PAPAL  PRINCIPLES. 


75 


tion  of  the  liberty  of  which  they  were  the  chosen  guardians 
until  their  terms  of  office  had  expired.  They  ate  in  common, 
each  being  provided  with  two  domestics,  and  having  at  their 
orders  a  secretary,  likewise  confined,  to  record  their  delibera¬ 
tions.  If  some  such  rule  were  adopted  at  Washington,  we 
should  have  less  “  Buncombe,”  and  more  business,  among  our 
legislators!  Notwithstanding  the  parsimony  of  the  Florentine 
commonwealth  toward  its  officers,  it  won  for  itself  the  sur¬ 
name  of  the  Magnificent,  from  its  great  deeds  in  art  and  war. 

The  principal  hall  of  the  palace  was  made  to  accommodate 
at  their  ease,  when  they  met  to  discuss  national  afiairs,  not 
less  than  one  thousand  citizens.  It  was  constructed  with  such 
rapidity  that  Savonarola  was  accustomed  to  say  that  angels 
worked  as  masons.  The  republic  enjoyed  its  stronghold  but 
for  a  brief  period,  for  thirty  years  later  it  became  the  residence 
of  its  tyrants. 

The  name  of  Savonarola  recalls  one  of  the  strangest  and 
most  tragic  events  history  has  preserved.  Savonarola  was 
born  in  1452.  From  infancy  he  manifested  an  austere  dispo¬ 
sition,  with  an  ardent  desire  to  connect  himself  with  the 
Church.  A  vision,  as  later  with  Loyola,  decided  his  career. 
He  was  then  twenty-two  years  of  age,  and  one  night,  hav¬ 
ing  dreamed  that  a  shower  of  ice  had  fallen  upon  his  na¬ 
ked  body,  he  suddenly  awoke,  and  resolved  to  dedicate  him¬ 
self  to  the  service  of  God,  who  had  in  this  manner  signified 
the  extinction  in  his  heart  of  the  warm  passions  of  youth. 
The  next  mornihg,  without  informing  his  friends  or  even  his 
parents,  he  fled  from  his  native  place  to  Bologna,  where  he 
took  the  white  habit  of  St.  Dominic.  He  remained  here  for 
some  time,  but  his  talents  and  devotion  made  so  slight  an  im¬ 
pression  upon  the  monks,  that,  when  the  war  broke  out  be¬ 
tween  Venice  and  Ferrara,  they  drove  him,  with  a  number  of 
others,  from  the  convent,  as  being  so  many  useless  mouths. 


ITALIAN  SIGHTS  AND  PAPAL  PRINCIPLES 


/o 


Savonarola  came  to  Florence,  where  he  found  an  opportunity 
to  preach  during  Lent  at  the  church  of  San  Lorenzo.  Lis  elo¬ 
quence,  if  he  then  possessed  any,  made  so  little  impression 
that-he  began  himself  to  doubt  of  the  legitimacy  of  his  call 
for  a  divine  mission.  He  then  retired  into  a  convent  in  Lom¬ 
bardy,  where  he  applied  himself  to  the  interpretation  of  the 
Holy  Scriptures  until  he  was  recalled  to  Florence  by  Lorenzo 
de  Medicis. 

The  time  which  he  had  passed  in  retirement  had  been  so 
well  spent  in  study  that  the  true  depth  and  power  of  his  genius 
speedily  began  to  manifest  themselves.  His  dryness  of  man¬ 
ner  and  rigidity  of  gesture  had  disappeared.  The  first  essays 
of  his  eloquence  were  so  enthusiastically  received,  that  the 
belief  that  he  was  chosen  of  God  as  his  mouthpiece  to  his 
people  again  moved  within  him.  The  times  were  ripe  for  a 
prophet.  At  the  head  of  the  Church  was  a  pope,  the  parent 
of  so  many  children  that  he  was  nicknamed  the  father  of  his 
people.  Religion  had  become  a  cloak  for  all  manner  of  de¬ 
bauchery,  while  Italy  was  rent  in  pieces  by  the  violence  of 
its  factions.  Then  Savonarola,  as  if  foreseeing  the  reformer  of 
Germany  who  was  soon  to  arise,  boldly  asserted  that  the  Holy 
Catholic  Church  was  about  to  be  cleansed  from  its  pollutions; 
that  Italy  would  be  beaten  with  rods,  and  that  these  events 
would  be  accomplished  previous  to  his  death,  which  would 
take  plaee  before  the  termination  of  the  century.  It  was  then 
1490.  The  boldness  of  these  predietions,  the  apparent  prox¬ 
imity  of  their  fulfillment,  joined  to  the  imposing  oratory  of  the 
preacher,  struck  awe  into  the  hearts  of  his  audience.  Luther 
fulfilled  his  first  prophecy  ;  the  Medici  and  Borgias  the  sec¬ 
ond  ;  as  for  the  third,  we  shall  see  in  what  manner  it  was  ac¬ 
complished. 

Savonarola  continued  to  preach  and  prophesy  with  such  ef¬ 
fect  that  no  church  in  Florence,  not  even  the  Diiomo,  which 


ITAJJAN  SIGHTS  AND  PAPAL  PRINCIPLES. 


77 


of  itself  could  contain  the  population  of  a  city,  was  sufficiently 
capacious  to  hold  his  audience  He  was  compelled  to  divide 
them,  as  has  done  an  equally  eloquent  clergyman  of  Rome  of 
our  day,  the  Father  Ventura,  into  classes,  according  tc  their  sex 
or  age,  devoting  separate  days  to  men  and  to  women,  and  even 
to  children.  So  rapidly  did  his  reputation  for  sanctity  aug¬ 
ment,  that  he  could  not  pass  to  and  from  his  convent  to  the 
church  without  a  guard  tc  clear  a  passage  through  the  dense 
masses  of  people  that  struggled  to  kiss  his  robe  and  receive 
his  blessing. 

This  devotion  dispelled  any  doubts  which  might  have  still 
haunted  him  of  his  being  the  chosen  oracle  of  the  Almighty. 
Henceforth  all  timidity  and  hesitation  were  banished,  and  he 
assumed  the  inflexible  tone  of  severity  and  denunciation  which, 
in  being  consistent  with  his  supposed  mission,  was  also  most 
natural  to  his  character.  No  rank  intimidated  or  ecclesiastical 
authority  awed  him.  He  was  the  direct  messenger  from  God, 
and  therefore  bound  to  speak  the  words  of  sober  truth  with 
equal  freedom  to  man,  prince,  or  pope.  Had  his  mind  been 
tempered  with  the  sound  reason  that  guided  the  Grerman  re¬ 
formers,  the  energy  and  courage  that  was  common  to  both 
would  have  made  of  him  a  Calvin  for  Italy.  But  his  ardent 
temperament,  characteristic  of  his  race,  and  the  mainspring  of 
his  influence  over  a  nation  more  prone  to  feel  than  to  reason, 
urged  him  on  from  one  step  to  another,  until,  in  his  enthusi¬ 
asm,  he  believed  himself  superior  to  the  laws  of  nature,  and 
accountable  only  to  Him  whose  agent  he  assumed  to  be.  His 
pride,  however,  was  based  upon  the  unyielding  strength  of 
moral  right,  and  his  energies  directed  solely  toward  the  ref¬ 
ormation  and  freedom  of  his  countrymen. 

In  1490  he  was  nominated  Prior  of  the  Convent  of  Saint 
Mark.  It  had  been  the  custom  with  his  predecessors,  on  the 
occasion  of  their  elevation  to  this  dignity,  to  present  their  horn- 


78 


ITALIAN  SIGHTS  AND  PAPAL  PRINCIPLES. 


age  to  Lorenzo  de  Medicis  as  the  supreme  chief  of  the  com¬ 
monwealth,  and  to  beseech  him  to  grant  to  their  order  his  pow¬ 
erful  protection.  Savonarola  was  too  zealous  a  republican  to 
recognize  an  authority  which  he  considered  as  usurped,  be¬ 
cause  not  founded  upon  the  suffrages  of  the  people.  He  re¬ 
fused  to  go.  His  friends,  with  politic  zeal,  sought  to  persuade 
him.  Even  the  haughty  Medician  prince  employed  artifice 
and  courtesy  to  induce  him  to  take  a  step  which,  if  omitted,  he 
felt  would  wound  both  his  pride  and  popularity.  Savonarola 
gave  one  answer  to  all :  “  He  was  Prior  of  God  and  not  of  Lo¬ 
renzo.  He  had  therefore  nothing  more  to  expect  from  him 
than  had  the  meanest  citizen.” 

Until  this  opposition,  Lorenzo  had  ruled  supreme  in  Flor¬ 
ence  since  the  conspiracy  of  the  Pazzi.  He  could  neither  over¬ 
come  nor  forgive  the  obstinacy  of  Savonarola.  The  poor  monk 
had  become  as  powerful  as  the  sovereign  prince.  He  sought 
to  interrupt  his  sermons  by  a  threat  conveyed  through  five  of 
the  principal  citizens.  The  rejoinder  was  a  discourse  more 
violent  than  any  of  its  predecessors,  at  the  conclusion  of  which 
he  announced  to  the  people  the  death  of  Lorenzo  as  nigh  at 
hand. 

The  austerity  of  Savonarola  was  not  confined  to  his  political 
and  religious  principles.  Equally  republican  in  his  manners, 
he  applied  the  stirring  notes  of  his  eloquence  and  the  force  of 
his  example  to  awaken  the  people  from  the  excessive  luxury 
and  sensual  pleasures  into  which  the  licentiousness  and  ex¬ 
travagance  of  the  Medici  had  plunged  them.  Florence  had 
become  another  Capua.  Its  new  princes,  in  establishing  their 
power,  had  corrupted  its  citizens.  Gold  and  amusements  had 
been  lavished  upon  them  until  the  Spartan  spirit  had  been 
extinguished,  and  the  erotic  morals  and  depraved  taste  of  de¬ 
generate  Athens  awakened  instead.  Savonarola  laid  the  axe 
with  bold  strokes  to  the  evil  tree  of  knowledge.  Its  root  was 


ITALIAN  SKiHTS  AND  PAPAL  PRLNCIPLES 


79 


to  be  drawn  out  into  full  daylight  and  consumed  in  the  flames. 
He  chose  the  season  of  Lent  to  commence  his  crusade  against 
the  debasing  superfluities  of  social  life.  Never  was  his  elo¬ 
quence  more  efl'ective.  Florence  brought  out  its  stores  of  li¬ 
centious  literature,  its  obscene  paintings  and  disgraceful  stat¬ 
ues,  its  laces,  jewels,  velvets  and  golden  habits,  the  treasures 
of  its  pride  and  sensuality,  and  heaped  them  together  in  the 
public  squares.  Even  Fra  Bartolomeo  contributed  the  instru¬ 
ments  of  his  art,  which  until  then  he  had  employed  in  pander¬ 
ing  to  the  vicious  caprices  of  his  countrymen,  threw  them  upon 
the  pile,  and  vowed  before  God  henceforth  to  apply  his  genius 
solely  to  his  service.  How  faithfully  he  kept  his  oath,  the 
chaste  and  spiritual  productions  of  his  pencil,  now  alone  to  be 
seen  in  the  galleries  and  churches  of  Florence,  sufficiently  at¬ 
test.  His  fame  and  his  works  were  alike  purified  by  fire. 
Savonarola,  followed  by  a  crowd  of  women  and  children  chant¬ 
ing  the  praises  of  Almighty  God,  left  the  Duomo,  and  marched 
in  triumph  from  pile  to  pile,  applying  the  torch  to  each,  until 
nothing  was  left  of  the  wealth  and  art  there  garnered  for  de¬ 
struction  but  ashes,  which  the  winds  soon  scattered  to  the  four 
quarters  of  heaven.  Daily  these  sacrifices  of  vanity  and  lust 
were  renewed,  until  luxury  trembled  for  her  existence  ;  but, 
like  all  unnatural  and  violent  excitements,  the  enthusiasm 
soon  passed  away  without  other  permanent  impression  than 
as  a  memorial  of  the  extraordinary  ability  of  the  monk  in  caus¬ 
ing  the  public  mind  to  vibrate  for  a  while  in  unison  with  his 
own. 

Eighteen  months  after  the  prediction  of  Savonarola,  Lorenzo 

the  Magnificent  found  himself  on  his  death-bed.  This  was 

the  9th  of  April,  1492.  Then  the  prince  recalled  to  mind  the 

Prior  of  Saint  Mark,  who  had  so  boldly  defied  his  power  and 

so  truly  foretold  his  end.  From  him  .only  would  he  receive 

absolution.  The  monk  this  time  obeved  his  summons,  but  not 

*1  * 


80 


ITALIAN  SIGHTS  AND  PAPAL  PRINCIPLES. 


more  promptly  than  he  would  have  hastened  to  the  bedside 
of  the  humblest  sinner  of  Florence  that  solicited  extreme  unc¬ 
tion  from  his  hands.  The  dying  Lorenzo  disburdened  his  con¬ 
science  by  a  long  catalogue  of  deeds,  known  and  unknown,  for 
which  he  would  have  in  vain  sought  for  a  warrant  in  the  word 
of  God.  Savonarola  promised  him  absolution  upon  three  con¬ 
ditions.  “  Name  them,”  demanded  the  prince,  grasping  eager¬ 
ly  at  stipulations  apparently  so  much  lighter  than  he  had  rea¬ 
son  to  expect. 

“  The  first,”  said  his  confessor,  “  is  that  you  acknowledge  a 
full  and  firm  faith  in  your  Creator.” 

“I  do,”  quickly  answered  Lorenzo. 

“  The  second  is,  that  you  restore,  as  far  as  possible,  the  prop¬ 
erty  that  you  have  wrongfully  acquired.” 

After  a  momentary  hesitation,  Lorenzo  replied,  “  This  is 
right ;  1  will  do  it.” 

“  The  third  is,  that  you  render  back  to  Florence  her  liberty.” 

“  As  to  that,  never,”  said  the  dying  man  ;  “  I  would  sooner 
be  d — d.”  Lorenzo  turned  his  back  toward  the  monk  with¬ 
out  uttering  another  word,  and  died  a  few  hours  after. 

This  event  augmented,  if  possible,  the  prophetic  reputation 
of  Savonarola.  Other  causes  contributed  also  to  increase  his 
influence.  The  evils  which  he  had  prophesied  were  in  store 
for  Italy,  began  now  to  assume  so  lowering  an  aspect  as  to  dis¬ 
pel  the  doubts  of  the  most  incredulous.-  Roderick  Borgia  was 
made  pope.  Charles  VIII.,  marching  to  the  conquest  of  the 
kingdom  of  Naples,  regarded  Florence  with  no  friendly  eye. 
Savonarola  was  deputed  to  meet  him.  He  approached  the  un¬ 
scrupulous  King  of  France  less  as  an  embassador  than  as  a 
prophet,  predicting  to  him  victory  if  he  restored  the  ancient 
liberties  of  Florence,  defeat  and  disgrace  should  he  confirm  its 
yoke.  The  descendant  of  Saint  Louis  paid  slight  regard  to 
one  he  regarded  as  a  fanatic  intermeddling  with  matters  of 


ITALIAN  SIGHTS  AND  PAPAL  PRINCIPI.ES. 


81 


public  policy.  Florence  was  betrayed  into  his  hands,  and  ho 
did  not  leave  it  until  the  decree  which  sequestered  the  prop¬ 
erty  of  the  Medici  and  placed  their  heads  at  a  price  was  an¬ 
nulled.  The  monk  was  again  right.  In  less  than  a  year, 
Charles  VIII.,  with  sword  in  hand,  was  forced  to  open  for  him¬ 
self  a  bloody  and  disgraceful  road  back  to  his  own  kingdom. 

The  fall  of  Peter  de  Medicis  placed,  as  it  were,  the  civil 
power  wholly  into  the  hands  of  Savonarola.  He  received  the 
commission  to  prepare  a  constitution.  Then  it  was  that  his 
democratic  ideas  became  fully  apparent.  He  established  his 
new  system  of  government  upon  the  most  liberal  and  popular 
basis  that  had  as  yet  been  presented  to  the  citizens.  The 
grand  principle  was  that  of  choice  by  the  entire  people  for  all 
offices  of  trust  or  honor.  The  citizens  elected  delegates  who 
represented  their  views  in  the  general  assembly,  for  the  ac¬ 
commodation  of  which  Savonarola  caused  to  be  built  the  fa¬ 
mous  hall  in  the  Palazzo  Yeechio,  which,  as  we  have  seen, 
could  accommodate  a  thousand  representatives. 

Successful  at  home  in  all  his  measures,  triumphing  over  the 
court  of  France,  and  showing  himself  no  mean  antagonist  of 
even  distant  England,  the  fearless  monk  prepared  to  enter  the 
lists  against  that  colossus  of  evil,  Alexander  VI.,  who  then  dis¬ 
graced  the  papal  throne  by  an  example  of  crime  and  debauch¬ 
ery  which  revived  the  recollections  of  the  most  scandalous  eras 
of  heathen  Rome.  The  resistless  tones  of  his  eloquence  reach¬ 
ed  the  Vatican.  The  Pope,  unable  to  gainsay  the  charges  of 
his  accuser,  thought  to  silence  him  by  the  usual  weapons  of 
papacy.  He  fulminated  a  bull,  in  which  he  retorted  upon  Sa¬ 
vonarola  the  charge  of  heresy,  and  forbade  him  to  preach.  Sa¬ 
vonarola  eluded  the  injunction  by  bringing  forward  Dominic 
Benvicini,  a  disciple,  who  had  sufficient  ability  and  courage  to 
fill  his  pulpit  and  use  his  weapons.  But  the  master  was  not 
of  a  temper  to  remain  long  silent.  His  reason  and  his  cause 

D  2 


82 


ITALIAN  SIGHTS  AND  PAPAL  PRINCIPLES. 


soon  divorced  him  from  the  mystic  influence  the  Church  of 
Rome  holds  over  all  her  followers,  or,  more  justly  speaking,  he 
found  a  refuge  amid  her  subtle  doctrines  for  his  ecclesiastical 
rebellion.  Upon  the  authority  of  the  Pope  Pelagius,  that  an 
unjust  excommunication  was  without  efficacy,  he  declared  that 
he  had  no  need  of  absolution  from  the  interdiction  of  Alexan¬ 
der  VI.  Accordingly,  on  Christmas,  1497,  he  reascended  the 
pulpit,  and  asserted  that  Christ  had  inspired  him  to  refuse  obe¬ 
dience  to  the  mandate  of  the  Pope,  on  account  of  the  crimi¬ 
nality  of  its  author.  Thenceforward  he  continued  to  preach 
against  the  successor  of  St.  Peter  with  increasing  energy  and 
license.  He  had  now  attained  the  height  of  his  influence. 
The  people  no  longer  regarded  him  simply  with  the  veneration 
due  a  prophet,  but  exalted  him  to  the  rank  of  a  new  Messiah, 
and  knelt  in  awe  as  often  as  he  passed  through  their  midst. 
His  mien,  however,  became  sad  and  humble  like  that  of  the 
Man  of  Sorrows.  Perhaps,  while  a  consciousness  of  his  ap¬ 
proaching  fate  stirred  within  him,  he  mourned  more  for  his 
country  than  for  himself. 

A  second  and  more  formidable  brief  was  forwarded  from 
Rome.  Alexander  VI.  threatened  to  confiscate  the  property 
of  all  Florentines  within  the  pontifical  territory,  and  to  put  the 
republic  under  interdict,  and  to  declare  her  the  spiritual  and 
temporal  enemy  of  the  Holy  Catholic  Church,  if  the  magis¬ 
trates  did  not  silence  the  contumacious  monk.  This  threat 
was  the  more  emphatic,  as  Caesar  Borgia  was  in  their  neigh¬ 
borhood  with  a  powerful  military  force.  Accordingly,  they 
bowed  before  the  coming  storm,  and  passed  the  order  for  Sa¬ 
vonarola  to  suspend  his  sermons.  He  obeyed  without  demur, 
because  resistance  would  have  been  to  infringe  the  laws  which 
he  had  himself  prepared  for  the  republic.  In  his  valedictory 
discourse  he  took  a  feeling  farewell  of  his  beloved  auditory. 
But  Alexander  VI.,  not  content  with  his  silence,  sought  to  root 


ITALIAN  SIGHTS  AND  PAPAL  PRINCIPLES. 


83 


out  his  influence  and  principles  by  sending  to  fill  his  pulpit  a 
preacher  from  Rome,  of  great  reputation  and  devoted  to  his 
interests.  It  was  in  vain,  however,  that  he  attempted  to  be 
heard.  The  moderation  of  Savonarola  was  not  imitated  by 
his  followers.  From  zeal  they  soon  passed  into  folly.  Flor¬ 
ence  became  one  field  of  fanatical  excitement.  To  his  other 
high  claims  upon  the  love  and  devotion  of  the  people,  Savo¬ 
narola  now  added  that  of  a  martyr  for  truth.  Reason  lost  all 
weight  in  the  spiritual  conflict,  and  the  supernatural  began  to 
mingle  in  the  strife.  There  were  tales  of  visions  ;  rumors  of 
miracles  and  prophecies  that  were  fast  being  realized.  The 
zeal  of  the  votaries  of  Savonarola,  which  he  was  unable  either 
to  check  or  guide,  drew  him  into  a  vortex  of  absurdity,  which 
the  sincerity  of  all  parties  alone  saved  from  becoming  blas¬ 
phemy.  They  went  so  far  as  to  claim  for  Savonarola  the 
power  to  raise  the  dead,  and  offered  to  put  him  to  the  test  on 
a  corpse  in  the  vaults  of  the  Cathedral. 

This  was  not  long  on  its  way  to  the  ears  of  Francis  de 
Pouille,  his  reverend  opponent  from  Rome,  a  man  of  equal  de¬ 
termination  and  greater  fanaticism.  More  than  this,  he  was 
ready  to  die  for  his  cause,  provided  that  his  death  could  insure 
its  triumph.  He  answered  the  vague  rumors  of  the  super¬ 
natural  powers  of  Savonarola  by  a  formal  challenge  to  enter 
jointly  with  him  into  a  fiery  furnace,  in  the  face  of  all  the 
people,  and  leave  to  God  the  recognition  of  his  elected  servant 
by  preserving  him  unharmed  amid  the  flames.  The  Brother 
Francis  was  not  deluded  by  an  exaggerated  religious  faith,  for 
he  made  this  proposition  simply  to  tempt  Savonarola  to  a 
proof  of  mutual  inspiration,  which  he  well  knew  must  end  in 
the  destruction  of  both.  His  object  was  to  destroy  an  uncom¬ 
promising  enemy  of  the  Church  even  at  the  cost  of  his  own 
life,  and  thus  save  a  multitude  of  souls  from  being  led  further 
astray  on  the  road  to  eternal  perdition. 


81 


ITALIAN  SIGHTS  AND  PAPAL  PRINCIPLES. 


Savonarola  was  not,  liowever,  to  be  duped  either  by  his  own 
claims  to  inspiration,  or  the  artifice  of  his  rival  in  so  strange  a 
proposition.  He  had  proposed  no  trial  himself.  There  was 
no  suffieient  reason  why  he  should  accept  one.  But  when  the 
tide  of  religious  phrensy  begins  to  rise,  no  mortal  can  assign 
its  limits.  What  the  master  declined  to  accept,  the  disciple  ea¬ 
gerly  rushed  to  seize.  His  old  substitute  in  the  pulpit,  Brother 
Dominic  Benvicini,  confident  in  the  direct  intervention  of  the 
Almighty,  on  his  own  responsibility  announced  his  readiness 
to  accept  the  trial  of  fire.  This  devotion  was  not  at  all  wel¬ 
come  to  the  Brother  Francis.  It  was  the  principal  whose  life 
lie  balanced  with  his  own,  and  not  that  of  a  second,  with  whom 
to  have  died  would  have  cost  him  the  coveted  triumph  of  his 
sacrifice.  , 

The  feverish  agitation  of  the  public  mind  kept  pace  with 
these  events.  Florence  literally  went  mad.  The  magistrates, 
who  would  willingly  have  stopped  the  increasing  folly,  dis¬ 
covered  that  their  sole  resource  was  to  guide,  for  it  was  too 
late  to  arrest  the  scandals.  As  soon  as  it  was  known  that 
the  Brother  Francis  refused  to  immolate  himself  with  other 
than  Savonarola,  two  Franciscans,  Nicolas  de  Billy  and  An¬ 
drew  de  Rondinelli,  volunteered  to  take  his  place.  The  parts 
in  this  anomalous  duel  were  now  filled,  and  the  people  waited 
for  the  termination  of  this  unholy  contest  in  a  state  of  excite¬ 
ment  that  would  brook  no  disappointment.  To  have  removed 
the  principals  from  the  city  would  have  exposed  it  to  a  fearful 
tumult.  The  anxiety  of  the  populace  to  behold  so  extraordi¬ 
nary  and  terrible  a  spectacle  was  not  alone  that  vulgar  curios¬ 
ity  which  finds  its  daintiest  nutriment  in  sights  of  mortal  ago¬ 
ny,  but  it  was  allied  to  the  mysterious  and  supernatural ;  for 
though  there  were  doubtless  many  scoffers,  there  were  fewer 
hearts  that  did  not  beat  tremulously  with  vague  hojpe  or  ex¬ 
pectation  of  an  exhibition  of  divine  intervention,  unknown  in 


ITALIAN  SIGHTS  AND  PAPAL  PIIINCIPLES. 


85 


the  history  of  man  since  the  days  of  the  prophet  Daniel.  The 
most  incredulous  minds  could  not  have  been  indifferent  to  a 
sight  which  was  shortly  to  test  the  exact  meaning  to  be  at¬ 
tached  to  the  parable  of  the  mustard  seed.  Even  in  our  own 
age,  we  have  seen  those  who  believed  in  the  literal  power  of 
removing  mountains  by  faith  alone.  If  the  mountains  did  not 
cast  themselves  into  the  sea  at  their  bidding,  it  was  owing 
solely  to  the  deadness  of  their  faith.  Here  was  to  be  an  ex¬ 
hibition  of  rival  faith,  sincere  on  both  sides,  which  was  to  do 
more  than  cast  mountains  into  the  sea.  It  was  to  triumph 
over  the  most  destructive  element  known  to  man,  and  convert 
the  flames  of  a  furnace  into  garments  of  celestial  glory. 

The  authorities  of  Florence,  by  undertaking  to  control  this 
strange  business,  lent  to  it,  though  unwillingly,  the  august 
sanction  of  their  official  position.  It  was  now  under  the  di¬ 
rection  of  the  state.  Dominic  Benvicini,  on  the  part  of  Sa¬ 
vonarola,  and  Andrew  Rondinelli,  who,  to  obtain  the  prefer¬ 
ence  over  his  brother  monk,  Nicolas  de  Filly,  proved  that  he 
had  anticipated  him  in  his  offer  to  represent  Francis  de  Pou- 
ille,  were  the  chosen  champions.  A  committee  of  the  citizens 
were  elected  to  decide  upon  the  day  and  place,  and  make  the 
necessary  arrangements.  They  fixed  upon  the  7th  of  April, 
1498,  on  a  spot  contiguous  to  the  Palace  of  the  People,  in  what 
is  now  the  square  of  the  Grand  Duke. 

Although  several  days  were  yet  to  elapse  previous  to  the 
trial,  the  people  crowded  the  square  in  such  masses  that  it 
was  impossible  to  erect  the  furnace,  until,  by  the  aid  of  numer¬ 
ous  troops,  a  sufficient  space  was  kept  clear  for  the  work  to 
proceed. 

The  portico  of  the  Lanzi,  on  the  right  of  the  Palazzo  Vec- 
chio,  so  famed  for  its  graceful  proportions  and  the  ancient  and 
modern  statuary  it  shelters,  comprising  the  Judith  of  Donatel¬ 
lo,  the  Perseus  of  Benvenuto,  and  the  Rape  of  the  Sabines  by 


86 


ITALIAN  SIGHTS  AND  PAPAL  PRINCIPLES. 


John  of  Bologne,  all  worthy  of  their  position  close  by  the  Da¬ 
vid  of  Michael  Angelo,  was  divided  into  two  compartments 
for  the  rival  clergymen  and  their  respective  partisans  ;  for 
friends  they  could  not  be  called  who  would  stimulate  them  to 
such  an  act.  In  front,  at  the  distance  of  a  few  rods,  a  wooden 
scaffold  was  erected  of  twenty -four  feet  in  length,  ten  in  width, 
and  five  in  height.  Upon  this  scaffold  was  piled  dry  fagots, 
pine  knots,  and  other  combustible  materials,  so  arranged  as  to 
leave  two  separate  passages  or  corridors  the  entire  length  of 
the  platform.  Through  these,  encircled  by  the  flames,  in  plain 
daylight,  so  that  the  spectators  could  see  them  enter  at  one 
end  and  walk  out  unscathed  by  the  fire  at  the  other,  provided 
their  faith  made  them  as  incombustible  as  asbestos,  the  two 
reverend  fanatics  were  to  pass.  The  preparations  were  all  in 
earnest ;  the  fires  were  to  be  as  fierce  as  the  most  inflamma¬ 
ble  substances  could  make  them  ;  there  was  no  opportunity  to 
arrange  a  false  miracle,  or  to  spare  either  candidate  from  an 
equal  test  of  the  fiery  ordeal. 

On  the  day  appointed,  Savonarola  called  upon  all  his  pros¬ 
elytes  to  assist  at  a  solemn  mass.  The  Franciscans,  on  the 
contrary,  quietly  took  their  places  in  the  stall  provided  for 
them  without  any  public  ceremony,  as  coolly  and  unconcern¬ 
edly  as  if  assembling  for  any  of  the  ordinary  offices  of  their  re¬ 
ligion.  The  mass  ended,  Savonarola,  instead  of  replacing  the 
host  in  its  tabernacle,  kept  it  in  his  hand,  and,  leaving  the 
church,  advanced  toward  the  place  of  trial.  He  was  followed 
by  all  the  monks  of  his  convent,  chanting  hymns,  and  a  vast 
crowd  of  citizens  who  favored  his  cause  ;  the  most  ardent  of 
whom,  so  confident  were  they  of  a  miracle  in  favor  of  their 
champion,  carried  themselves  the  torches  with  which  to  fire 
the  pile.  Dominic  walked  with  them,  the  most  confident  of 
all,  smiling  and  often  kissing  the  feet  of  a  crucifix  which  he 
held  in  his  hands. 


ITALIAN  SIGHTS  AND  PAPAL  PRINCIPLES. 


87 


There  was  not  an  eye  in  Florence  on  that  day  that'  did  not 
seek  to  rest  on  the  scaffold.  Not  only  the  square  and  streets 
were  crowded  to  repletion,  but  the  balconies  and  roofs  of 
houses,  and  even  the  distant  platform  of  the  Campanile,  the 
towers  of  the  Bargello,  and  the  roof  of  the  Duomo,  were  en¬ 
cumbered  with  spectators.  Well  they  might  be,  for  it  was  a 
sight  not  likely  .to  be  seen  twice  on  earth. 

Dominic  Benvicini  stepped  forward  and  announced  that  he 
was  ready  to  enter  the  furnace.  There  was  a  hesitation  on 
the  part  of  the  Franciscans.  It  is  possible  that  they  were  ap¬ 
palled  by  the  steadfast  assurance  of  Dominic,  and  sought  for 
some  subterfuge  to  escape  from  the  consequences  of  their  own 
defiance.  They  charged  their  opponents  with  sorcery,  and 
protecting  themselves  by  charms  and  talismans.  To  disprove 
these  accusations,  Dominic  allowed  himself  to  be  examined  by 
physicians,  threw  off  his  clothes,  reclad  himself  with  those 
furnished  by  the  judges,  and  again  asked  Andrew  Rondinelli 
if  he  were  ready.  Obliged  now  to  leave  his  stall,  he  came  for¬ 
ward  as  if  prepared  to  make  the  trial,  when,  glancing  at  his 
adversary,  he  stopped  abruptly  and  refused  to  go  farther.  At 
that  moment  Savonarola  had  placed  in  the  hands  of  Dominic 
the  host.  Rondinelli  exclaimed  that  it  would  be  a  sacrilege  to 
expose  the  body  and  blood  of  the  Savior  to  be  burned.  Be¬ 
sides,  if  Dominic  should  escape,  the  miracle  would  not  be  con¬ 
clusive,  since  it  was  not  the  rebel  monk,  but  the  well-beloved 
Son  of  God  that  was  spared  by  the  flames.  He  declared,  in 
consequence,  that,  unless  the  Dominican  renounced  this  super¬ 
natural  aid,  he  would  renounce  the  proof. 

Savonarola  insisted  upon  the  presence  of  the  host.  Rondi¬ 
nelli  refused  to  yield  his  position.  Both  parties  engaged  in  a 
warm  and  fruitless  argument,  which  lasted  four  hours.  In  the 
mean  while  the  spectators,  who  were  exposed  to  a  burning  sun, 
grew  impatient,  and  loudly  manifested  their  displeasure  at  the 


88 


ITALIAN  SIGHTS  AND  PAPAL  PRINCIPLES. 


delay.  They  had  come  to  see  others  burned,  and  not  to  be 
burned  themselves.  To  put  an  end  to  the  tumult  and  strife, 
Dominic  Benvicini  said  that  he  would  give  up  the  host,  and 
make  the  trial  with  a  simple  crucifix.  No  objections  could  be 
alleged  to  this,  as  the  crucifix  was  only  the  image  and  not  the 
real  presence  of  the  Savior.  Once  again  it  was  announced 
that  the  trial  was  about  to  commence.  The  people  forgot 
their  fatigue,  and  as  loudly  applauded  the  infatuated  monks 
as  if  they  had  been  awaiting  the  entrance  on  a  stage  of  some 
favorite  actors.  • 

Every  avenue  of  escape  from  the  fiery  proof  seemed  now 
closed  to  both  parties.  They  started  together,  but  at  the  same 
instant,  as  if  Heaven  had  forborne  to  the  latest  moment  to  see 
to  what  extent  the  folly  of  men  would  go,  a  violent  storm, 
which  had  been  gathering  unseen,  burst  over  the  city  and  del¬ 
uged  it  with  rain.  The  fire  was  instantly  extinguished.  In 
vain  they  applied  fresh  torches,  and  brought  fire  and  inflamma¬ 
ble  substances  from  the  neighboring  houses  Torrents  of  wa¬ 
ter  continued  to  fall  and  put  out  the  flames  There  was  more 
to  fear  from  a  deluge  than  a  conflagration. 

The  spectators,  who  had  been  wrought  up  to  the  highest 
pitch  of  excitement,  now  vented  their  rage  at  their  disap¬ 
pointment  upon  the  parties,  accusing  them  both  of  having 
conjured  up  the  storm.  They,  in  their  turn,  retorted  upon 
each  other  the  same  accusation.  The  multitude  began  to 
look  upon  them  as  charlatans  who  had  played  them  a  dirty 
trick.  Notwithstanding  the  rain  which  continued  to  fall,  no 
one  would  obey  the  order  of  the  magistrates  to  retrie  to  their 
homes.  They  continued  their  menacing  outcries,  and  threat¬ 
ened  a  serious  disturbance.  A  guard  was  given  to  the  two 
adversaries  to  insure  their  safety  to  their  respective  convents. 
Savonarola  escaped  violence  by  holding  aloft  the  holy  sacra¬ 
ment,  but  Rondinelli  was  saluted  with  a  shower  of  stones,  and 


ITALIAN  SIGHTS  AND  PAPAL  PRINCIPLES. 


89 


cries  of  rage  and  contempt.  He  finally  reached  his  sanctuary 
half  murdered,  and  with  his  clothes  torn  into  shreds. 

The  people  that  had  so  lately  exalted  Savonarola  to  a  level 
with  Divinity,  in  their  desire  to  expiate  their  own  weakness, 
now  turned  upon  him  with  the  usual  unreasonableness  of 
those  who  have  more  to  forgive  in  themselves  than  in  others. 
That  rain-storm,  in  preserving  the  spectators  from  being  ac¬ 
complices  in  a  blasphemous  trial  of  the  natural  laws  of  Provi¬ 
dence,  had  at  the  same  time  washed  away  every  vestige  of 
his  former  sacred  prestige.  With  a  fickleness  and  ingratitude 
that  does  human  nature  signal  dishonor,  they  forgot  his  emi¬ 
nent  services  and  great  virtues.  They  forgot,  too,  that  the  de¬ 
fiance  came  not  from  him.  They  saw  not  in  the  extinguish¬ 
ment  of  the  fire  the  disapprobation  of  Heaven,  but  the  magic 
art  of  a  false  prophet.  From  walking  with  angels,  they  fell 
at  once  to  sport  with  demons. 

PTancis  de  Pouille,  the  adroit  agent  of  Alexander  VI.,  profit¬ 
ed  by  the  reaction  to  arouse  against  Savonarola  every  enemy 
that  interest  or  bigotry  could  create.  The  partisans  of  the  ex¬ 
iled  Medici  hated  him,  because  his  democratic  institutions 
prevented  their  return  to  power.  Many  of  the  clergy  believed 
him  accursed  of  God  so  long  as  he  remained  under  the  anath¬ 
ema  of  a  pope.  With  them,  the  authority  of  the  Head  of  the 
Church  was  independent  of  all  personal  considerations.  The 
Franciscans  saved  their  own  credit  in  the  proportion  that  they 
took  an  active  part  against  him.  They  cried  “  Stop  thief!” 
lest  they  should  themselves  be  considered  as  robbers.  If  he 
had  any  friends  left  besides  the  brethren  of  his  convent,  they 
were  to  be  found  only  among  the  few  in  Florence  whose  rea¬ 
son  was  neither  to  be  duped  by  fanaticism  nor  disgraced  by 
passion.  These  few  were  unable  to  protect  him. 

Savonarola  lost  no  time,  however,  in  seeking  to  regain  his 
position  On  the  very  next  day  he  ascended  the  pulpit  to  ex- 


90 


ITALIAN  SIGHTS  AND  PAPAL  PRINCIPLES. 


plain  his  conduct,  and  do  away  the  evil  impression  created  on 
the  preceding  by  an  intervention  of  nature  as  unexpected  by 
him  as  by  the  people.  But  they  drowned  his  voice  in  fero¬ 
cious  shouts.  On  every  side  was  heard,  “  Down  with  the  ex¬ 
communicated  !  down  with  the  heretic !  death  to  the  false 
prophet !’'  from  those  who,  less  than  twenty-four  hours  before, 
had  knelt  before  him,  too  happy  if  they  could  but  touch  the 
hem  of  his  garment.  He  sought  refuge  in  his  convent.  The 
crowd  followed  him  there,  swelled  at  each  step  by  new  ene¬ 
mies.  They  burst  open  the  gates,  demanding  their  victim. 
He  opened  his  cell  and  stood  before  them.  For  an  instant 
they  wavered,  for  they  had  long  been  accustomed  to  tremble 
before  him.  A  friendly  voice,  prompt  at  touching  the  right 
chord  in  the  aroused  public  mind,  might  have  saved  him. 
But  none  was  raised.  The  zealots  of  the  Medici  faction  threw 
themselves  upon  him,  shouting,  “  To  the  stake  with  the  here¬ 
tic  !  Let  us  gibbet  the  false  prophet !”  These  ominous  notes 
were  repeated  by  a  thousand  voices  as  they  dragged  their  for¬ 
mer  idol  to  a  shameful  death.  But  his  end  was  not  yet  to  be. 
The  magistracy,  informed  of  the  tumult,  had  assembled  in  haste 
some  troops.  They  rescued  him  in  part  by  force,  but  more  by 
the  assurance  that  justice  should  promptly  take  its  course. 

The  fickle  multitude  had  not  long  to  wait  their  prey.  In 
forty-two  days  only  after  the  failure  which  had  so  enraged 
them,  on  the  twenty-third  of  May,  they  again  assembled  in  the 
same  place  to  witness  a  spectacle  still  more  terrible,  for  its 
memory  would  forever  remind  heaven  and  earth  of  their  cru¬ 
elty  and  injustice.  Another  scafibld  had  been  erected.  Upon 
it,  bound  to  a  post,  were  the  three  victims  whose  dying  ago¬ 
nies  were  to  replace  the  previous  loss.  These  three  were 
Jerome  Savonarola,  Silvester  Maruffi,  and  Dominic  Benvicini, 
the  disciple,  faithful  in  death,  as  he  had  been  through  life,  to 
his  master. 


ITALIAN  SIGHTS  AND  PAPAL  PRINCIPLES. 


91 


This  time  there  was  no  disappointment.  The  fire  burned 
fiercely,  and  human  nerves  crackled  and  snapped  in  the 
flames.  But  the  spirit  triumphed  over  the  flesh.  Hymns  of 
praise  arose  amid  the  smoke,  and  bore  toward  heaven  the  ev¬ 
idence  of  a  faith  which  took  no  heed  of  bodily  anguish  in  the 
superior  consciousness  of  approaching  celestial  joys.  Savo¬ 
narola,  with  his  eyes  turned  toward  heaven,  expired  without 
a  groan. 

He  was  no  sooner  dead  than  the  populace  repented  them 
of  their  sacrifice.  His  enemies  continued  to  blacken  his  fame, 
as  they  had  calumniated  his  life.  But  the  people  missed 
their  benefactor  and  counselor.  They  could  not  recall  their 
victim,  but  they  could  honor  his  memory.  Each  year,  on  the 
anniversary  of  his  death,  the  place  of  his  scaffold  was  found 
strewn  with  flowers  by  invisible  hands.  It  was  said  that  an¬ 
gels  thus  celebrated  the  fete  of  the  martyr.  This  tribute  con¬ 
tinued  to  augment  yearly,  reviving  the  memory  of  the  liberal 
principles  and  austere  morality  of  Savonarola,  until  it  led  to 
renewed  religious  commotions.  The  supreme  power  had  re¬ 
turned  to  the  Medici.  Cosmo  I.  was  resolved  to  put  an  end 
to  this  pretext  for  popular  demonstrations,  but  he  dared  not 
encounter  openly  the  public  sympathies.  He  employed  art. 
Ammanato  was  ordered  to  erect  a  fountain  on  the  site.  It  is 
to  him  that  we  owe  the  colossal  statue  in  marble  of  Neptune 
with  his  pigmy  steeds,  which  has,  through  the  succeeding  cen¬ 
turies,  continued  to  pour  its  limpid  stream  upon  the  spot  so 
indelibly  stained  by  Are. 

A  strange  event  happened  some  fifteen  years  ago  to  one  of 
the  bronze  figures  of  the  size  of  life  which  adorn  the  edge  of 
the  basin.  For  two  months  it  was  missed,  and  not  the  slight¬ 
est  clew  could  be  obtained  to  the  cause  of  its  disappearance. 
At  last  it  was  discovered  that  it  had  been  stolen  during  the 
night  by  an  English  amateur,  but  the  means  which  enabled 


ITALIAN  SIGHTS  AND  PAPAL  PRINCIPLES 


him  so  adroitly  to  carry  ofi  without  detection  from  a  public 
square  a  statue  weighing  one  ton,  remained  as  great  an  enig¬ 
ma  as  ever. 

Opposite  the  fountain  is  the  Post-office,  and  over  the  win¬ 
dows  of  delivery  is  an  antique  ]»rojec1ing  rool’  nr  poreli  of 


ITALIAN  SIGHTS  AND  PAPAL  PRINCIPLES 


!) 


> 

> 


wood,  unsupported  by  columns,  Jind  which  looks  momentarily 
as  if  about  to  tumble  upon  the  heads  of  the  letter-seekers  be¬ 
neath.  It  would  not  be  strange  if  it  did,  for  it  dates  back 
nearly  five  hundred  years,  and  was  made  by  the  compulsory 
labor  of  the  enemies  of  Florence,  whose  spirits  doubtless,  even 
at  this  interval,  would  be  rejoiced  to  grind  the  descendants  of 
their  conquerors  into  dust,  in  revenge  for  the  brutality  to 
which  they  were  subjected.  They  were  Pisans,  to  the  num¬ 
ber  of  two  thousand,  that  had  been  taken  prisoners  at  Gallot- 
to,  where  one  thousand  of  their  fellow-citizens  were  left  dead 
on  the  field.  The  two  thousand  prisoners  were  conducted  to 
Florence  in  forty-two  carts.  At  the  gates  they  were  igno- 
miniously  taxed  a  shilling  a  head,  the  duty  levied  on  cattle. 
Afterward  they  were  drawn  in  triumph,  with  trumpets  sound¬ 
ing,  through  the  city,  and  forced  to  descend  in  the  square  of 
the  public  palace  and  kiss  the  statue  of  Marsocco,  the  lion  em¬ 
blem  of  the  city,  as  they  defiled  in  its  rear.  Two  of  the  pris¬ 
oners,  unable  to  endure  the  humiliation,  strangled  themselves 
with  their  chains.  The  others  were  required  to  build  the 
shelter  mentioned  above,  which  has  ever  since  been  called  the 
Roof  of  the  Pisans. 


CHAPTER  TV. 


THE  ARTS  AND  ARTISTS  AT  FLORENCE. 

Perhaps  there  is  no  trade  that  has  more  tricks  than  that  of 
the  picture-dealer.  It  is  worth  while  coming  to  Florence,  if 
one  have  a  taste  for  the  fine  arts,  to  learn  something  in  this 
line  by  way  of  caution,  particularly  at  a  time  when  gullibility 
commands  so  high  a  premium  in  all  that  relates  to  the  relics 
of  antiquity  and  the  works  of  the  “  great  masters.”  The 
amount  of  trash  annually  palmed  off  on  the  discerning  critics 
of  Russia,  England,  and  America,  on  the  authority  of  great 
names,  is  truly  astonishing,  and,  too,  for  sums  of  money  that 
would  create  an  El  Dorado  for  modern  artists.  Whatever  is 
either  rare  or  beautiful  is  sure  to  beget  a  corresponding  pas¬ 
sion,  for  the  gratification  of  which  it  becomes  necessary  to 
fabricate  counterfeits.  Thus  Italy,  which  has  given  birth  to 
the  finest  works  of  art,  has  also  produced  the  most  ingenious 
race  of  imitators.  Gems,  precious  stones,  vases’,  coins,  statu¬ 
ettes,  bas-reliefs,  bronzes,  and  paintings,  all  genuine,  antique, 
or  original,  are  multiplied  with  such  an  extraordinary  facility 
that  it  really  seems  as  if  they  were  rather  the  perennial  crop 
of  nature  than  the  labor  and  study  of  man.  The  manner  of 
the  reproduction  of  paintings  is  more  wonderful  than  that  of 
the  phoenix,  for  the  new  do  not  await  even  the  ashes  of  the 
old.  Nor  may  any  one  pride  himself  upon  being  an  infallible 
judge  of  an  original,  when  he  remembers  that  Guido  had 
among  his  pupils  so  successful  an  imitator  that  the  scholar 
was  enabled  to  substitute  for  the  incomplete  original  his  un- 


ITALIAN  SIGHTS  AND  PAPAL  PRINCIPLES. 


95 


finished  copy,  which  Guido  continued  to  labor  upon  as  his 
own.  Neither  does  it  follow  that  an  original  painting  by  a 
great  master  is  necessarily  a  good  one.  If  each  had  great 
merits,  they  had  also  characteristic  faults.  Guido  often  com¬ 
menced  and  finished  several  paintings  on  the  same  day,  to 
provide  means  to  indulge  his  passion  for  gaming.  Others 
painted  as  rapidly  by  candle-light.  So  that  it  does  not  follow 
that  because  an  artist  immortalized  himself  by  certain  produc¬ 
tions  which  in  his  peculiar  style  have  never  been  excelled, 
every  touch  of  his  pencil  is  equally  worthy  of  his  genius. 
Many  “  gems,”  whose  originality  can  be  well  established,  and 
which  have  cost  their  purchasers  their  weight  in  gold,  would, 
if  their  genealogy  had  been  lost,  have  been  deposited  among 
the  unsightly  lumber  of  the  garret,  while  others  of  really  ten¬ 
fold  more  merit  hang  unnoticed  on  walls  simply  for  want  of 
the  name  of  a  “  great  master.”  The  temptation,  therefore,  to 
picture-dealers  to  indulge  in  this  sort  of  baptism  is  irresistible. 
If  the  painting  be  too  fresh,  a  worm-eaten  frame,  a  skillful 
smoking,  an  ingenious  story  as  to  its  discovery  in  some  old 
convent,  or  purchase  from  some  dilapidated  family,  for  whose 
gallery  Titian,  Paris  Birdone,  the  Caracchi,  Salvator  Rosa,  or 
Domenichino  painted,  make  it  a  great  deal  more  original  than 
the  original  itself.  If  any  lingering  doubts  should  exist  in  the 
mind  of  the  amateur,  who,  while  examining  a  bad  copy  or  the 
work  of  a  feeble  imitator,  has  his  mind  more  occupied  with 
the  impression  that  the  chef-d’oe.uvres  have  produced  upon 
him  than  the  subject  before  his  eyes,  which  he  envelops  with 
the  halo  of  their  great  names,  it  is  speedily  dispelled  by  the 
certificates  of  high  tribunals  and  professional  judges,  who,  for 
a  consideration,  are  but  too  ready  to  attest  its  legitimacy.  In 
this  manner,  many  a  picture,  that  cost  the  purchaser  but  a  few 
dollars,  has  been  triumphantly  borne  off,  at  as  many  thousands, 
by  gentlemen  of  taste  and  fortune,  to  greet  the  admiring  eyes 


96 


ITALIAN  SIGHTS  AND  PAPAL  PRINCIPLES. 


of  the  learned  amateurs  of  the  old  masters  in  Europe  or  the 
United  States,  or,  what  is  quite  as  likely,  to  extort  a  smile  of 
derision  at  that  taste  which  could  find  merit  in  such  dilapidated 
and  obscure  daubs.  In  this  way  a  great  wrong  is  often  done 
to  great  reputations,  for  they  are  made  responsible  for  the  sins 
of  their  counterfeiters.  The  best  specimens  of  the  earliest 
masters  are  more  valuable  as  records  of  the  progress  of  art 
than  for  examples  of  its  perfection.  Thus  Cimabue  and  Giotto 
shine  chiefly  by  contrast  with  their  predecessors.  But  the  an¬ 
gelic  beauty  of  the  faces  of  Beatico  Angelico  is  proverbial,  and 
so  with  Perugino,  Da  Vinci,  Andrea  del  Sarto,  and  Raphael, 
there  are  individual  peculiarities  of  style  so  exquisitely  per¬ 
fected  that  they  must  forever  remain  “  masters”  in  those  arts. 

The  progress  of  painting  has  been  gradual,  each  great  artist 
and  celebrated  school  adding  something  toward  its  various  de¬ 
grees  of  perfection.  No  one  is  equally  good  in  all,  or  always 
equal  to  himself  A  correct  knowledge  of  anatomy  and  per¬ 
spective  was  attained  by  slow  degrees,  while  coloring  varies 
with  the  taste  or  feeling  of  each  master.  Those  world-re¬ 
nowned  pictures  of  Titian  and  his  school,  that  so  dazzle  by 
their  beauteous  and  harmonizing  tints,  are  not  remarkable  for 
their  close  resemblance  to  common  nature.  They  form,  as  it 
were,  a  nature  of  themselves,  or  create  one  to  us  by  selecting 
those  aspects  which  we  most  rarely  see.  I  doubt  if  any  man 
would  wish  the  complexion  of  his  wife  to  be  of  the  same  tint 
as  Titian’s  Flora,  and  the  idea  of  her  resembling  one  of  Vasari’s 
Madonnas,  or  Michael  Angelo’s  Titanic  women,  would  strike 
him  with  horror ;  but  worse  than  all  would  be  his  fate  were 
one  of  Rubens’s  Flemish  nudities,  with  her  adipose  propor¬ 
tions,  crooked  legs,  and  bruised  flesh  coloring,  to  step  from  her 
canvas  and  claim  him  for  her  liege  lord.  Neither  would  he 
like  any  more  to  acknowledge  that  Bacchanal-looking  infant, 
called  the  Holy  Child,  which  we  see  in  the  Pitti,  by  the  same 


ITALIAN  SIGHTS  AND  PAPAL  PRINCIPLES. 


97 


pencil,  for  his  own,  for  fear  that  his  friends  would  suspect  him 
of  having  substituted  the  bottle  for  the  nipple  in  the  rearing 
of  his  offspring.  Raphael’s  and  Perugino’s  trees  are  as  flat  as 
petrifactions.  Bronzino’s  flesh  might  often  he  mistaken  for 
putty.  Fra  Bartolomme’s  figures,  at  least  some  of  them,  as¬ 
tonish  more  than  they  please  by  their  colossal  dimensions. 
We  all  wish  that  Guido  had  found  smaller  hands  and  less 
expansive  throats  for  his  models — that  Carlo  Dolci  had  put 
less  jewelry  and  finish  upon  his  holy  women — that  Paul  Ver¬ 
onese,  in  his  Marriage  of  Cana,  had  not  placed  men  on  roofs 
so  steep  that  you  are  nervous  from  fear  that  they  will  slip  off; 
and,  lastly,  let  me  say  it  with  reverence  both  for  the  subject 
and  its  otherwise  faultless  treatment,  that  Raphael  had  given 
to  his  Madonna  della  Seggiola  that  inimitable  divine  expression 
which  he  has  bestowed  upon  others  of  his  Madonnas,  and  which, 
in  general,  characterizes  his  earlier  holy  faces,  and  makes  him 
peerless  in  this,  the  highest  aim  of  art.  The  Seggiola  Madon¬ 
na  is  a  beautiful  woman,  surpassingly  beautiful,  but  conscious 
of  the  fact,  and  with  the  faintest  twinkle  of  coquetry  in  her 
eyes,  averted  from  her  child  to  demand  the  admiration  of  the 
spectator.  But  this  very  expression,  beyond  the  copyist’s  art 
or  the  skill  of  the  engraver,  proclaims  the  marvelous  genius 
of  the  artist.  He,  has  given  the  world,  in  this  painting,  the 
highest  type  of  the  natural  mother.  If,  in  doing  this,  he  has 
robbed  her  of  her  celestial  glory,  he  has  but  made  her  the 
more  lovely  inhabitant  of  earth.  She  is  not  the  virgin  moth¬ 
er  of  God,  but  the  loving  wife  of  man. 

Thus,  if  we  were  to  indulge  in  captious  criticism,  we  shouki 
lose  one  half  the  pleasure  artistic  genius  holds  in  store.  Its 
true  test  is  its  power  over  us  as  a  whole.  That  must  be  good 
which  for  ages  has  continued  to  hold  the  world  spell-bound 
by  feeling,  and  which  to  criticise  in  mechanical  detail  re¬ 
quires  close  study,  developing,  as  it  were,  a  qualm  of  con- 

E 


98 


ITALIAN  SIGHTS  AND  PAPAL  PRINCIPLES. 


science  in  the  necessity  of  sinking  the  noble  art  to  reach  the 
lower. 

Florence,  more  than  any  other  city,  may  be  said  to  live  on 
its  pictures.  True,  architecture,  statuary,  and  mosaics  each 
contribute  toward  her  support,  but  the  chiefest  resource  is  paint¬ 
ing.  Her  own  citizens  probably  know  less  of  the  galleries,  as 
freely  open  to  all  the  world  as  if  they  were  the  common  prop¬ 
erty  of  mankind,  than  my  own  countrymen.  What  private 
collection  rivals  the  Pitti  ?  Arranged  in  chambers  that  are 
truly  marvelous  in  themselves  for  the  delicacy  and  magnifi¬ 
cence  of  their  ornaments,  we  find  those  superb  originals  which 
have  been  made,  by  copies  and  engravings,  so  familiar  to  the 
world.  There  are  about  four  hundred  pictures,  but  among  them 
more  chef-d’oeuvres  of  the  Italian  school  than  any  other  col¬ 
lection  in  Europe,  with  the  exception  of  the  Louvre  and  the 
Escurial.  My  own  experience  on  first  beholding  other  cele¬ 
brated  galleries  has  been  that  of  disappointment,  because  my 
imagination  over-painted  the  reality,  and  it  has  only  been,  as 
it  were,  by  degrees  that  I  have  been  led  to  estimate  their 
treasures  at  their  true' standard.  The  number,  too,  of  worth¬ 
less  of  uninteresting  pictures  which  swell  their  catalogues 
strengthens  this  eft’ect.  But  at  the  Pitti  it  is  quite  difierent. 
On  entering  the  hall  of  Lorenzo  il  magnijico,  I  felt  myself,  as 
it  were,  in  the  presence  of  the  Genius  of  Painting  herself.  It 
was  like  coming  suddenly  upon  a  landscape  so  beautiful  that 
the  tongu'e  becomes  dumb  from  inability  to  express  the  full¬ 
ness  of  the  sensations  of  the  soul.  Each  painting  invited  at¬ 
tention,  and  each  was  a  rival  to  its  neighbor.  No  one  thinks 
of  talking  aloud  in  those  halls.  They  are  subdued  into  silence 
by  the  solemnity  of  art.  The  souls  of  those  masters  who  gave 
suc*h  life  and  power  to  canvas  seem  still  to  linger  about  their 
favorite  works,  enjoying  the  silent  homage  of  generation  after 
generation  of  their  fellow-men,  as  they  come  up  from  distant 


ITALIAN  SIGHTS  AND  PAPAL  PRINCIPLES. 


99 


lands  to  learn  from  them  new  conceptions  of  truth  and  beauty. 
There,  too,  we  see  those  superb  portraits,  each  a  passport  to 
immortality  to  painter  and  sitter :  Raphael’s  Leo  the  Tenth 
and  Julius  the  Second  ;  Titian’s  Cardinal  Ippolito  dei  Medici ; 
his  mistress,  more  beautiful  even  than  his  Urbino  Venus  ;  the 
portrait  of  Cornaro,  the  advocate  and  example  of  longevity  ; 
the  Venetian  gentleman  in  black  ;  Lotto’s  Three  Ages  of  Man  ; 
Subterman’s  magic  touches,  and  Rubens’s  famous  group,  all 
as  if  ready  to  step  out  from  their  frames,  and  play  their  parts 
over  again  in  the  role  of  life. 

To  do  justice  to  this  gallery  would  be  to  write  the  history 
of  art  in  its  greatest  excellence.  The  Uffizii  collection  em¬ 
braces  a  wider  range  of  objects.  It  is  a  museum,  and  incloses 
within  its  halls  an  epitome  of  the  history  of  the  world  for  the 
last  three  thousand  years.  There  IViobe,  in  her  imperishable 
grief,  with  her  dying  children  struck  by  Apollo’s  darts  ;  the 
Q.ueen  of  Loveliness,  faultless,  if  she  had  been  left,  like  her  sis¬ 
ter  of  Milo,  as  antiquity  bequeathed  her  to  modern  eyes  ;  her 
companion  in  beauty,  the  Apollino,  the  Faun,  the  Wrestlers, 
and  the  Mysterious  Slave,  have  all  found  an  asylum.  The 
classical  ages  were  prolific  in  statues.  It  strikes  one  oddly 
that  the  moderns  should  house  with  such  sacred  care  every 
relic  of  the  ancient  chisel,  whatever  may  be  its  merits,  while 
they  turn  their  own  productions  so  unceremoniously  out  of 
doors.  Two  thousand  years  hence,  they  too  will  probably  be 
taken  under  shelter  as  too  venerable  to  bear  farther  exposure 
to  the  ravages  of  the  climate,  while  skillful  hands  will  be  em¬ 
ployed  to  restore  them  to  their  original  symmetry. 

The  busts  of  the  Roman  Emperors  are  exceedingly  interest¬ 
ing,  commencing  with  Pompey,  who,  by  the  way,  never  wore 
the  imperial  robe,  and  terminating  with  Constantine  the  Great. 
Julius  Caesar’s  head  struck  me  as  of  the  Henry  Clay  order. 
There  are  two  of  his  busts,  and -both  show,  by  the  manner  of 


100 


ITALIAN  SIGHTS  AND  PAPAL  PRINCIPLES. 


dressing  the  hair,  his  anxiety  to  conceal  his  baldness,  which 
made  him  more  covetous  of  the  honor  of  receiving  from  the 
Senate  the  right  of  always  wearing  the  laurel  crown  on  this 
account  than  for  conquering  the  world.  Yespasian  looks  like 
a  hale  old  gentleman,  “  all  of  the  olden  time.”  He  has  a  firm, 
fatherly  sort  of  countenance.  Titus  was  decidedly  the  hand¬ 
somest  gentleman  of  them  all — an  imperial  Bayard — and  well 
bears  out  his  reputation  of  being  “the  delight  of  the  world.” 
There  is  a  Nero  of  about  six  years  of  age,  a  chubby,  innocent 
face,  very  unlike  his  matured  physiognomy  after  having  mur¬ 
dered  his  mother,  friends,  and  most  of  his  relatives.  Hair¬ 
dressing  must  have  been  well  understood  at  ancient  Rome,  for 
among  the  busts  of  the  empresses  and  their  daughters  there 
are  fashions  to  be  seen  which  are  really  worthy  of  revival  by 
modern  beauties. 

The  Hall  of  the  Bronzes  contains  a  veritable  mystery,  found 
at  Arezzo  in  1559.  Books  have  been  written  upon  it,  but  its 
elucidation  is  as  remote  as  ever.  It  is  an  Etruscan  bronze  of 
the  size  of  a  St.  Gothard  dog,  with  three  heads  :  the  first  is 
called  that  of  a  lion,  but  is  more  of  the  dragon  order,  and  is,  at 
all  events,  a  nondescript ;  the  second  grows  from  his  back, 
and  is  that  of  a  goat ;  the  third  is  that  of  a  serpent,  which 
forms  the  tail,  and,  turning  over  the  back,  bites  one  of  the 
horns  of  the  goat-shaped  head.  Its  attitude  is  fierce  and 
threatening,  half  crouching,  as  for  a  spring.  Modern  writers 
have  christened  it  the  Chimera,  and  no  doubt  it  is  quite  as 
comely  an  animal  as  that  we  often  bag  after  a  chase  of  a  life¬ 
time. 

To  my  mind,  Michael  Angelo  appears  to  better  advantage  in 
his  unfinished  than  his  finished  statuary.  He  appears  to  have 
so  thought  himself,  if  a  judgment  may  be  formed  from  the 
number  he  left  in  the  former  condition.  There  is  about  them 
the  stamp  of  a  powerful  genius,  of  conceptions  too  grand  for 


ITALIAN  SIGHTS  AND  PAPAL  PRINCIPLES. 


101 


mortal  execution.  The  hand  that  struck  out  those  rough 
sketches  could  have  fashioned  the  solid  stone  at  will ;  so  con¬ 
ceive  our  imaginations,  as  they  complete  the  works  that  he  be¬ 
gan.  But  when  he  finishes,  he  exaggerates ;  he  delights  in  huge 
muscular  developments,  and  strains  after  anatomical  effect. 
Ilis  men  and  women  are  Brobdignags,  with  voluminous  folds 
of  flesh,  into  which  a  Lilliputian  could  creep  and  hide.  His 
eye  measured  every  thing  on  a  Titanic  scale,  as  if  his  aim  was 
rather  to  astonish  than  to  please.  The  easel-paintings  that 
claim  to  be  his  show  the  same  bent  of  genius.  He  despised 
this  branch  of  art  as  frivolous,  and  fit  only  for  women  or  chil¬ 
dren.  The  Tribune  contains  his  famous  tondo  of  a  Holy  Fam¬ 
ily,  painted  for  the  Doni.  It  bears  more  the  character  of  the 
chisel  than  the  brush — hard,  bold,  strained  in  attitude,  and  of 
a  color  positively  disagreeable.  He  was  right  when  he  esti¬ 
mated  himself  as  too  great  for  the  details  of  oil  painting.  But, 
perhaps,  the  true  secret  of  this  opinion  was  his  unwillingness 
to  pursue  a  branch  in  which  his  rival  Raphael  excelled  him 
so  greatly. 

The  Tribune  is  to  the  XJffizii  what  the  Holy  of  Holies  was  to 
the  Temple  of  Jerusalem.  In  this  sanctuary  are  assembled 
the  gems  of  art.  Perhaps  no  other  room  of  its  size  in  the 
world  contains  such  a  collection  of  masterpieces  of  painting 
and  sculpture.  But  these  are  subjects  to  which  description  iS 
inadequate  to  do  justice.  To  be  appreciated,  they  must  be 
seen  and  felt  by  appreciating  power.  Each  spectator  may  ex¬ 
perience  different  sensations,  as  tastes  differ,  but  all  will  con¬ 
fess  to  the  opening  to  them  of  a  new  world  of  beauty. 

The  study  of  painting  is  much  like  that  of  human  nature. 
The  character  of  the  artist  can  be  read  in  the  treatment  of  his 
subjects.  They  give  the  reflection  of  the  inner  soul.  His  pas¬ 
sions,  prejudices,  and  weaknesses,  as  well  as  his  great  and 
good  points,  appear  on  the  canvas.  A  painter,  like  a  trage- 


103 


ITALIAN  SIGHTS  AND  PAPAL  PRINGJPJ.ES. 


dian,  must  feel  what  he  would  express,  if  he  would  paint 
truth.  Any  thing  short  of  this  becomes  cold  and  mannered. 
In  seeing  but  one  picture,  we  see  the  incomplete  man  or  art¬ 
ist.  Who,  in  gazing  upon  the  “  Esperanza”  of  Guido,  would 
recall  the  fierce  painter  that,  in  composing  his  “  Crucifixion,” 
eager  to  catch  and  transfer  to  his  canvas  the  expression  of  dy¬ 
ing  agony,  in  his  delirium  of  art  snatched  a  knife  and  stabbed 
in  the  side  his  helpless  model,  bound  to  a  cross  to  represent 
the  dying  Savior  ?  The  poor  wretch  was  murdered,  but  Gui¬ 
do  caught  the  parting  breath,  completed  his  picture  that  night, 
and  fled.  He  was  missed,  and  three  days  after  his  studio  was 
forced  open  in  the  search  for  him.  There  were  found  the 
painting,  now  at  Bologna,  and  the  corpse,  still  lashed  to  the 
cross,  in  a  state  of  decomposition.  Years  of  exile  sufficed 
to  expiate  his  crime.  He  was  suffered  to  return  to  Rome  and 
resume  his  art,  for  the  popes  could  better  spare  a  hecatomb  of 
models  than  one  such  artist,  of  whose  death  Canova  said  that 
Heaven  gained  at  the  expense  of  earth.  Guido  was  a  sad 
profligate.  Genius  is  a  light  lent  by  Heaven  to  illumine  the 
earth.  He  who  returns  it  not  to  its  shrine  as  pure  and  bright 
as  when  received,  may  hope  from  its  mercy,  but  must  tremble 
before  its  justice. 

In  the  Tuscan  school  there  is  a  painting  by  Lucio  Massari, 
who  flourished  between  1569  and  1633,  that  pleased  me 
greatly — perhaps  I  should  say  amused — from  the  manner  of 
treatment  of  a  subject  which  has  exhausted  the  invention  and 
genius  of  artists,  from  St.  Luke  to  our  day.  It  was  a  Holy 
Family,  and  their  employment  was  decidedly  original,  so  far  as 
the  imaginations  of  painters  have  run  ;  though,  when  we  con¬ 
sider  their  poverty,  and  that  both  Joseph  and  his  son  worked 
at  a  mechanical  trade,  nothing  more  likely  than  this  was  likely 
to  occur  in  their  household  duties.  Still,  the  ideas  connected 
with  the  Holy  Family,  daguerreotyped  as  they  are  in  our 


ITALIAN  SIGHTS  AND  PAPAL  PRINCIPLES. 


103 


minds  by  the  devotional  masterpieces  of  Raphael  and  the 
teachings  of  our  catechisms,  are  so  foreign  to  Massari’s  very 
natural  treatment  of  the  subject,  that  it  seems  not  only  irrev¬ 
erent,  but  ludicrous.  The  scene  is  a  brook  in  the  neighbor¬ 
hood  of  Nazareth,  overshado-wed  by  trees.  The  Virgin  is 
scrubbing  the  family  linen  on  stones,  after  the  usual  fashion 
in  these  countries,  and  laying  it  aside  in  a  tub.  The  infant 
Jesus  is  picking  out  the  articles  one  by  one,  and  handing  them 
to  St.  Joseph,  who  is  hanging  them  up  to  dry.  The  attitudes 
of  the  three  are  very  natural,  and  suggestive  of  a  rural  wash- 
ing-Monday. 

The  Dutch  school,  which  is  so  minutely  true  to  nature  in  all 
its  homely  aspects,  furnishes  some  most  extraordinary  exam¬ 
ples  of  the  grotesque  when  it  aspires  to  sacred  subjects.  In 
an  adjoining  hall  we  find  the  raising  of  Lazarus,  by  Nicholas 
Frumenti,  in  1461 — a  painting  in  the  form  of  a  tabernacle. 
The  costumes  of  the  fifteenth  century  are  sent  back  to  do  duty 
in  the  first.  A  monk,  with  a  book  in  one  hand,  is  helping 
Lazarus  to  rise.  He  has  just  opened  his  eyes  in  his  coffin, 
and  is  represented  as  precisely  in  that  ghastly  condition  when 
he  may  be  supposed  to  fully  justify  the  scriptural  relation  in 
regard  to  his  physical  condition.  Mary,  overcome  by  the  odor, 
has  covered  her  mouth  with  her  robe  ;  a  soldier  looks  on  with 
an  expression  which  literally  seems  to  turn  his  nose  upside 
down  ;  while  the  spectators  generally  are  much  more  disgusted 
with  the  smell  than  astonished  by  the  miracle. 

In  the  hall  of  Baroccio  there  are  four  of  the  richest  tables, 
in  fine  stones  and  gems  of  the  manufactory  of  Florence,  in  ex¬ 
istence.  The  one  in  the  centre  of  the  hall  is  the  richest  in  the 
world.  It  was  commenced  in  1613,  and  employed  twenty-two 
workmen  incessantly  for  twenty-five  years,  costing  upward  of 
one  hundred  thousand  dollars,  and  using  up  a  mine  of  topazes, 
onyxes,  agates,  lapis-lazuli,  pearls,  and  other  valuable  gems- 


104 


ITALIAN  SIGHTS  AND  PAPAL  PRINCIPLES 


Nothing  more  magnificent  can  be  conceived  ;  but  I  was  mucli 
more  interested  in  the  eagle  of  the  twenty-fourth  Roman  le¬ 
gion,  in  the  collection  of  bronzes,  and  the  kitchen  utensils  and 
silver  vessels  of  the  Consul  Flavius  Artaburius,  marked  with 
his  name,  and  dating  back  some  twenty-two  hundred  years. 
1  could  not  help  thinking  what  a  nice  point  it  would  be  for  the 
lawyers  to  decide,  were  any  descendant  of  the  family  to  claim 
his  ancestral  plate  of  the  Grand  Duke. 

Besides  the  Pitti  and  Uflizii  galleries,  there  are  others,  be¬ 
longing  to  noblemen,  always  open  to  the  public,  such  as  the 
Corsini,  Strozzi,  Ferroni,  and  Torrigiani,  each  possessing  some 
celebrated  paintings.  The  private  galleries  have,  however, 
greatly  diminished  before  the  seductions  of  British  and  Rus¬ 
sian  gold.  The  renowned  Rinuccini  gallery  was  lately  sold 
at  auction,  and  attracted  purchasers  from  all  parts  of  Europe. 
Never  was  a  name  turned  to  better  account.  With  many  am¬ 
ateurs,  a  bad  picture,  with  a  great  name,  is  a  greater  prize  at  a 
thousand  pounds  sterling,  than  a  good  picture,  equally  original, 
but  lacking  the  weighty  testimony  of  celebrated  authorship,  at 
a  hundred  dollars.  There  were  fine  pictures  in  the  Rinucci¬ 
ni  gallery,  and  their  merit  shed  a  golden  halo  upon  all  their 
companions.  It  was  considered  an  infallible  test  of  merit  for 
a  picture  that  it  had  hung  in  the  Rinuccini  gallery  ;  conse¬ 
quently,  paintings  not  worth  ten  dollars  sold  for  hundreds. 
The  bait  took  so  well  that  the  gallery  appeared  inexhaustible, 
like  the  stock  of  a  deceased  epicurean’s  wines.  Even  now, 
the  custode  will  tell  you,  in  showing  you  the  remaining  paint¬ 
ings,  that  the  best  are  still  unsold,  offering  a  Raphael  for  fif¬ 
teen  thousand,  and  a  Michael  Angelo  for  ten  thousand  dollars. 
There  are  left,  however,  two  undoubted  Salvator  Rosa’s,  well 
worthy  the  attention  of  the  lovers  of  his  style,  which  may  be 
had  at  not  a  very  extravagant  price. 

Florence  lives  upon  strangers,  and  paintings  are  the  great 


ITALIAN  SIGHTS  AND  PAPAL  PRINCIPLES. 


105 


attraction  that  draws  them  hither.  Without  its  galleries  half 
its  population  would  starve.  They  are  to  it  an  inexhaustible 
placer,  so  long  as  the  rage  for  copies  exist.  The  public  taste 
centres  on  a  comparatively  few  subjects.  Sassoferato’s  blue- 
mantle  Madonna,  Carlo  Dolci’s  poetry  and  devotion,  the  Ma¬ 
donna  della  Seggiola,  Titian’s  Flora,  and  a  few  others,  are 
multiplied  without  end.  Nearly  one  quarter  of  the  year  is 
lost  to  copyists  at  Florence  on  account  of  the  numerous  fete- 
days,  when  the  galleries  are  closed.  Of  the  best  pictures,  it 
requires  from  one  to  two  months  to  take  faithful  copies  ;  con¬ 
sequently,  there  can  be  made  of  each  but  a  few  annually  from 
the  original  itself.  Such,  too,  is  the  number  of  applications  for 
permission  to  copy,  that  artists,  who  follow  in  turn,  are  often 
obliged  to  wait  several  years  for  an  opportunity.  The  Madon¬ 
na  della  Seggiola  is  engaged  from  ten  to  fifteen  years  in  ad¬ 
vance — a  compliment  which,  on  a  much  briefer  scale,  would 
quite  turn  the  head  of  any  dancing  damsel  at  a  ball.  From 
this  it  will  readily  be  inferred  that  good  copies  must  be  com¬ 
paratively  rare,  and  yet,  within  this  century,  there  have  been 
enough  made  in  Italy  of  celebrated  pictures,  one  would  sup¬ 
pose,  to  reach  from  New  York  to  New  Orleans. 

I  do  not  know  the  number  of  artists  and  students  in  Flor- 
•  ence,  but  they  are  a  legion.  Nowhere  have  they  better  facil¬ 
ities  for  pursuing  their  studies.  If  there  be  any  drawback, 
compared  with  other  schools,  it  is  the  scarcity  of  good  living 
models.  The  liberality  of  the  government  provides  an  Acad¬ 
emy  of  Design,  and  the  use  of  the  galleries,  easels,  &c.,  gratis. 
Private  owners  are  no  less  generous.  And,  for  a  student  or 
poor  artist,  Florence  is  the  most  economical  of  cities.  It  is 
really  surprising  upon  how  little  they  can  exist  in  comparative 
comfort.  I  use  the  word  comjort  in  the  artistic  standard,  which 
would  not  suit  every  body.  Less  than  fifty  cents  a  day  will 
suffice,  divided  as  follows :  for  a  chamber,  scantily  furnished, 

E  2 


106  ITALIAN  SIGHTS  AND  PAPAL  PRINCIPLES. 


he  pays  five  cents  a  day ;  six  cents  for  his  breakfast,  and  six¬ 
teen  for  dinner,  leaving  quite  a  balance  for  other  necessaries. 
Mr.  Powers  pays  two  hundred  and  twenty  dollars  annual  rent 
for  an  establishment  which  in  New  York  he  could  not  hire 
for  less  than  several  thousand  dollars. 

Good  artists  residing  in  Florence  have  another  advantage 
in  possessing  the  market,  as  it  were,  of  the  world.  Hundreds 
here  purchase  works  of  art  from  the  fact  that  their  attention 
is  here  first  awakened  to  its  value  as  a  source  of  pure  gratifi¬ 
cation.  Besides,  example  is  contagious.  I  have  known  a 
friend,  who  proposed,  on  his  arrival,  to  limit  himself  to  a  few 
cheap  copies,  carry  away  nearly  one  hundred  original  paintings. 

But  modern  artists  of  merit  have  much  to  contend  against. 
The  cheapness  at  which  copies  are  furnished  drives  them  from 
the  field  of  originality  to  labor  in  that  of  mere  imitation,  be¬ 
cause  there  are  now  but  comparatively  few  purchasers  of  orig¬ 
inal  pictures  at  prices  which  really  recompense  an  artist.  Good 
copies,  too,  sometimes  command  a  price  much  beyond  what 
the  artist  could  expect  from  an  original  composition  ;  as,  for  in¬ 
stance,  one  thousand  dollars  is  occasionally  paid  by  a  discrim¬ 
inating  patron  for  the  same  subject  of  which  he  could  get  a 
copy,  which  would  pass  equally  well  with  the  public,  for  fifty 
dollars.  Very  tolerable  copies  of  the  favorite  paintings  are 
manufactured  for  from  ten  to  sixty  dollars  each.  The  secret 
is  this.  The  artists  are  Florentines,  having  homes,  and  per¬ 
haps  food,  furnished  them  by  their  families.  It  costs  them  the 
merest  pittance  for  a  support,  and  if  they  gain  a  few  pauls, 
say  fifty  cents  per  day,  they  are  satisfied.  It  is  pitiable  to  see 
art  so  reduced,  while  their  labors  are  of  doubtful  benefit  to  the 
world  in  general,  except  so  far  as  they  may  foster  a  taste 
which  will  ultimately  demand  for  its  gratification  something 
higher  than  a  feeble  imitation  of  the  standard  of  past  centu¬ 


ries. 


ITALIAN  SIGHTS  AND  PAPAL  PRINCIPLES. 


107 


In  Italy,  however,  this  competition  for  daily  bread,  instead 
of  excellence,  produces  disastrous  effects.  With  few  excep¬ 
tions,  the  original  native  artists  produce  nothing  worthy  even 
of  being  classed  above  the  standard  of  mediocrity.  They  la¬ 
bor,  however,  under  the  great  disadvantage,  in  point  of  com¬ 
parison,  of  being  in  company,  as  it  were,  with  the  acknowl¬ 
edged  masters  of  the  world.  The  gulf  between  them  has 
become  lamentably  wide. 

If  modern  copies  and  paintings  in  Florence  can  be  counted 
by  myriads,  there  seems  to  be  equally  a  mine  of  old  copies  and 
originals  as  inexhaustible  as  the  coal-pits  of  England.  For 
centuries  Italy  has  been  furnishing  the  rest  of  Europe  with 
pictures,  yet  the  supply  still  remains  as  plentiful  as  its  beg¬ 
gars.  Lumber-rooms  are  stored  with  them ;  streets  are  lined 
with  them  ;  every  tailor  has  his  gallery  ;  each  Italian  gentle¬ 
man  his  heir-looms  ;  in  short,  Florence  is  a  vast  picture-shop. 
One  would  imagine  that  every  man,  woman,  and  child,  for  the 
last  century,  had  been  born  with  pencil  in  hand.  There  is  no 
possibility  of  diminishing  them.  Hercules  could  clean  the  Au¬ 
gean  stables,  but  it  would  be  a  greater  exploit  to  empty  Flor¬ 
ence  of  its  pictures.  I  know  one  dealer  who  has  sold  twelve 
thousand  in  England  alone — at  least  he  says  so — and  yet  his 
rooms  are  full  to  repletion,  though  he  is  diminishing  his  stock 
to  give  up  business.  Cargoes  go  annually  to  the  United  States. 
We  are  treated  to  the  arts  much  after  this  fashion.  I  am  re¬ 
lating  a  true  story.  A  speculator  arrives,  and  gives  out  that 
he  is  a  purchaser  of  pictures  by  the  wholesale.  A  flock  of 
crows  can  not  light  sooner  upon  an  open  corn-bag  than  do  the 
sellers  upon  him.  He  is  not  after  good  pictures,  but  the  trash  ' 
that  can  be  bought  for  the  value  of  the  wood  in  their  frames. 
They  are  brought  to  him  by  wagon-loads.  He  looks  at  the 
pile,  and  makes  an  offer  according  to  its  size.  In  this  way  he 
buys  several  thousand  daubs  at  an  average  of  a  few  dimes 


ITALIAN  SIGHTS  AND  PAPAL  PRINCIPLES. 


]  8 


each,  spends  as  much  more  in  varnish,  regilding,  and  a  little 
retouching,  sends  them  to  America,  where  they  are  duly  ofthr- 
ed  for  sale  as  so  many  Titians,  Tandy cks,  Murillos,  or  other 
lights  of  the  European  schools.  One  lucky  sale  pays  for  the 
entire  lot. 

No  other  art  affords  a  wider  scope  for  fraud.  This  arises 
from  the  conventional  values  placed  upon  different  styles. 
One  amateur  seeks  age,  and  gloats  over  worm-eaten  frames  and 
dilapidated  canvas  ;  another  detects  beauty  amid  what  to  oth¬ 
ers  appear  but  hopeless  masses  of  dirt  and  varnish;  others 
buy  by  proxy,  and  pin  their  taste  to  another’s  interest  or  van¬ 
ity  ;  comparatively  few  buy  with  discrimination,  consequently 
the  cheat  and  counterfeiter  have  a  wide  field.  Besides,  as  the 
values  of  all  such  objects  must  be  graduated  by  an  arbitrary 
scale,  or  are  the  result  of  a  caprice,  they  feel  no  compunctions 
at  levying  the  greatest  possible  amount  of  tribute  the  pur¬ 
chaser’s  purse  or  gullibility  will  stand.  There  are  fair  dealers, 
but  Italian  reputation  in  general,  in  this  respect,  is  of  a  slip¬ 
pery  character.  After  all,  it  does  not  seem  to  be  a  heinous  sin, 
if  faith  is  created  in  the  coveted  genuineness  of  any  article, 
when  it  quadruples  the  pleasure  of  the  buyer  and  fills  the 
purse  of  the  seller  in  the  same  ratio.  Without  it  there  would 
have  been  no  profit  to  the  one  or  joy  to  the  other.  The  mer¬ 
its  of  the  picture  w^ould  have  remained  unknown,  and  two  good 
bargains  lost.  Still,  I  have  known  a  dealer  to  carry  his  trick¬ 
ery  beyond  the  reach  of  any  charitable  extenuation  ;  as,  for 
instance,  to  have  a  fine  copy,  in  a  frame,  exposed  as  a  sample, 
for  which  a  buyer  was  found,  at  what  appeared  a  reasonable 
price,  the  bargain  concluded,  and  the  purchaser’s  name  marked 
by  himself  on  the  back  of’ the  picture.  Upon  receiving  it  at 
home,  however,  he  could  not  believe  his  own  senses,  so  infe¬ 
rior  did  it  appear  to  the  one  he  selected  ;  but  on  the  back  there 
was  the  evidence  of  his  own  handwriting.  Upon  investiga- 


ITALIAN  SIGHTS  AND  PAPAL  PRINCIPLES. 


109 


tion,  however,  it  was  proved  that  the  seller  had  two  pictures 
in  the  same  frame,  the  outer^one  being  good  and  the  inner  bad, 
and  that  he  had  withdrawn  the  former  and  sent  the  latter. 

With  all  its  drawbacks  in  the  shape  of  trash  and  trickery, 
Italy  still  offers  to  the  amateur  of  good  pictures  his  best  field. 
This  is  not  surprising  when  we  consider  that,  for  four  centu¬ 
ries,  it  has  abounded  in  artists  of  real  merit.  The  disciples  of 
the  great  masters  multiplied  their  works  and  diffused  their 
genius  broadcast  over  the  land.  Many  of  them  lived  and 
painted  to  a  great  age.  Titian  employed  his  brush  until  his 
death,  which  only  occurred  when  within  a  year  of  completing 
a  century ;  Michael  Angelo  died  at  eighty-nine  years  of  age  ; 
Guido  at  sixty-seven ;  the  prolific  Carlo  Dolci  at  seventy-two  ; 
and  Guercino  at  seventy-six.  Raphael  lived  to  be  but  thirty- 
seven,  but,  whenever  he  appeared  at  the  papal  court,  he  was 
followed  by  a  train  of  fifty  of  the  first  artists,  his  scholars, 
many  of  whom  acquired  great  distinction.  Lanzi,  in  the  last 
century,  finds  some  three  thousand  Italian  artists  worthy  to  be 
mentioned  in  his  History  of  Painting.  It  will  readily  be  be¬ 
lieved,  therefore,  that  Italy  still  contains  an  ample  supply  of 
good  paintings.  These  are  only  to  be  found  by  bestowing  time 
and  patience  to  the  search.  It  is  of  no  use  to  be  turned  aside 
by  the  bait  of  a  great  name,  for,  if  authentic  and  worthy  of  its 
origin,  the  picture  is  sure  to  be  prized  at  many  thousands  of 
dollars,  and  to  find  competitors  for  its  purchase  from  all  parts 
of  Europe.  Such  pictures  have  their  history  and  genealogy 
as  carefully  recorded  as  that  of  the  noblest  of  families,  and  to 
change  owners  becomes  an  event  in  the  history  of  art ;  and 
ten  to  one,  supposing  yourself  tempted  into  such  a  purchase, 
you  would  find  that  a  substitute  has  been  palmed  upon  you, 
while  the  original  is  slumbering  peacefully  in  some  gallery  of 
Russia  or  convent  in  Spain.  There  are,  however,  good  paint¬ 
ings  still  to  be  had,  originals,  which  might  chan<ie  places  to  ad- 


110 


ITALIAN  SIGHTS  AND  PAPAL  PRINCIPLES. 


vantage  with  many  that  are  stamped  as  celebrated  in  the  pub¬ 
lic  galleries,  and  at  prices  much  under  the  rates  that  modern 
artists  would  demand  for  similar  excellence.  They  have  the 
advantage,  also,  of  having  stood  the  test  of  time  in  their  color¬ 
ing.  When  such  are  discovered,  the  shortest  way  of  treating 
for  them  is  to  politely  smile  at  the  owner’s  tale  of  their  origin 
as  an  agreeable  fiction  ;  to  impress  upon  him  that  you  buy  pic¬ 
tures,  not  names,  and  are  guided  merely  by  your  fancy  in  your 
choice.  When  he  discovers  that  your  taste  is  purely  individ¬ 
ual,  and  that  the  genealogy  of  the  brush  makes  no  impression 
upon  either  your  purse  or  imagination,  he  becomes  reasonable, 
and  acknowledges  he  knows  no  more  about  the  paintings  than 
that  he  purchased  them  at  such  a  time  and  at  such  a  place, 
and  believes  them  to  be  of  such  a  school ;  he  is  quite  sure  to 
conclude  by  accepting  one  quarter  of  what  he  first  asked.  In¬ 
deed,  I  have  known  a  dealer  fall  from  one  hundred  and  sixty 
dollars  to  four,  rather  than  miss  the  sale.  He  probably  bought 
it  for  as  many  francs.  Those  who  deal  most  with  the  English 
pretend  to  fixed  prices,  but  they  actually  rise  and  fall  like  a 
Nova  Scotia  tide.  The  only  rule  is  to  fix  upon  the  price  you 
are  willing  to  pay  for  the  gratification  of  your  whim  or  taste, 
and  abide  by  it.  The  probability  is  that  even  then  the  dealer 
will  be  delighted  with  your  custom  ;  but  you  will  do  better 
yet,  if  you  can  afford  it,  to  leave  discretionary  orders  at  re¬ 
munerating  prices  with  your  countrymen  artists  for  original 
productions.  This  will  stimulate  them  to  rival  or  surpass  the 
excellence  of  the  ancient  art  you  so  much  admire,  and  be  a 
patriotic  contribution  toward  American  fame.  Americans  have 
already  taken  the  lead  in  bust  sculpture.  They  often  receive 
a  thousand  dollars  for  a  bust,  while  the  best  Italian  artists  are 
content  with  a  third  of  that  sum.  It  is  gratifying  to  perceive 
that  the  same  comparative  difference  of  prices  obtains  between 
the  original  productions  and  copies  of  American  and  Italian 


ITALIAN  SIGHTS  AND  PAPAL  PRINCIPLES. 


Ill 


painters.  While  we  have  such  artists  in  Italy  as  Page,  Tilten, 
White,  and  others  that  might  be  named,  we  need  not  despair 
of  an  American  school  which  shall,  in  time,  win  a  respectable 
rank  in  comparison  even  with  the  past. 

It  may  be  doubted  whether  painting  will  ever  again  be  cul¬ 
tivated  in  any  country  with  so  much  enthusiasm  as  it  was  at 
Florence  at  that  period  when  science,  genius,  and  wealth  com¬ 
bined  to  give  it  its  greatest  excellence.  The  Medician  sover¬ 
eigns  impoverished  their  country,  but  they  made  it  the  home 
of  the  arts,  which,  however,  they  degraded  to  mean  ends. 
Painting  became  a  passion.  It  was  employed  for  every  pur¬ 
pose.  Bread  itself  was  not  more  common.  Not  only  the  in¬ 
teriors  of  houses  were  decorated  throughout,  so  that  not  a  ves¬ 
tibule  or  passage-way  was  left  unpainted,  but  even  the  exteri¬ 
ors,  from  the  eaves  to  the  foundation,  were  so  beautifully  fres¬ 
coed,  that  their  designs  and  colors,  even  now,  after  the  lapse  of 
centuries,  excite  our  admiration  by  their  beauty  and  freshness. 
In  his  chamber  or  in  the  street,  at  church  or  in  his  shop,  above 
him,  around  him,  on  his  garden  walls,  whichever  way  a  Flor¬ 
entine  turned  his  eyes,  he  beheld  the  marvelous  results  of  the 
art  which  lent  to  stone  and  mortar  all  the  attractions  of  the  nat¬ 
ural  landscape,  and  the  artistic  creations  of  the  most  numerous 
and  varied  assemblage  of  talents  the  world  had  then  beheld, 
within  the  walls  of  one  small  city  ;  but  he  was  not  content 
with  even  this  deluge  of  the  art.  The  most  common  domestic 
utensils  were  submitted  to  its  adorning  hands.  He  painted 
his  furniture,  the  trunks  and  boxes  which  contained  his  clothes 
and  family  stores.  The  bucklers  of  their  warriors,  the  shields 
for  the  tournament,  and  the  trappings  of  the  horses,  were  dec¬ 
orated  by  the  hands  of  the  best  artists.  Painting  was  to  his 
refined  imagination  what  gold  was  to  the  barbarous  Mexican. 
It  was  displayed  everywhere.  In  Rome  and  throughout  Tus¬ 
cany,  no  girl  married  who  did  not  bestow  with  her  dowry,  by 


112 


ITALIAN  SIGHTS  AND  PAPAL  PRINCIPLES. 


contract,  and  classed  among  the  family  jewels,  some  celebrated 
painting,  usually  a  Madonna.  If  the  real  flesh  and  blood 
proved  uncongenial,  the  husband  had  always  the  resource  of 
falling  back  for  consolation  upon  the  virtues  of  the  ideal  wom¬ 
an,  which,  unlike  the  living,  improved  with  age,  and  were  at 
any  moment  transmutable  into  gold. 

» 

So  conscious  are  the  Tuscan  and  Roman  governments  of 
the  importance  of  conserving  within  their  territories  the  best 
productions  of  their  celebrated  masters,  as  an  attraction  for 
foreign  travel,  that  they  allow  no  paintings  whatever  to  be  ex¬ 
ported  without  an  examination  by  a  professional  tribunal. 
There  is  no  difficulty  in  obtaining  their  authorization  for  paint¬ 
ings  in  general ;  but  to  procure  permission  to  take  away  an 
undoubted  original  of  the  first  water  would  be  as  difficult  as 
to  obtain  an  invitation  to  visit  the  Emperor  of  Japan.  These 
will  not  leave  Italy  again  until  some  future  Napoleon  makes 
them  the  forfeit  of  broken  treaties  or  the  ransom  of  kingdoms. 
They  are  best  where  they  are,  and,  like  the  ruins  of  classical 
Italy,  should  remain  forever  on  their  natal  soil,  to  attest  her 
former  greatness,  and  stimulate  her  sons  to  revive  her  ancient 
renown. 

Perhaps  in  the  entire  range  of  criticism  there  is  nothing 
more  ludicrously  uncertain  than  the  decisions  of  would-be  au¬ 
thorities  in  painting.  This  arises  partly  from  the  fact  that  it 
is  as  easy  to  find  a  good  artist  as  a  true  connoisseur,  and  partly 
from  the  empirical  or  interested  judgments  of  amateurs.  Cen¬ 
turies  of  acquiescence  in  the  claims  of  some  celebrated  orig¬ 
inal  of  a  famous  collection  are  no  defense  against  its  authen¬ 
ticity  being  stolen  from  it,  or  at  least  disputed  at  the  eleventh 
hour.  The  public  galleries  are  filled  with  contested  pictures, 
and  few  of  the  private  are  allowed  to  possess  a  gem  uncon¬ 
tradicted  by  some  rival  amateur,  more  jealous  to  establish  a 
name  than  to  possess  true  merit.  These  controversies  enlist 


ITALIAN  SIGHTS  AND  PAPAL  PRINCIPLES. 


iia 


not  only  authors,  but  nations,  in  their  respective  causes.  In  a 
number  of  instances,  the  proofs  and  merits  are  so  equally  bal¬ 
anced,  that  it  would  he  doubtful  if  the  artist  himself  could, 
should  he  return  to  earth,  unhesitatingly  point  out  his  own  off¬ 
spring.  Andrea  del  Sarto  copied  Raphael’s  Leo  the  Tenth  so 
truthfully  that  it  was  marked  in  order  to  distinguish  it  from 
the  original.  Those,  therefore,  whose  artistic  triumph  depends 
not  so  much  upon  the  excellence  of  their  painting  as  upon  the 
great  parentage  they  claim  for  it,  must  live  in  constant  fear 
and  trembling,  lest  their  laurels  be  rudely  snatched  away  when 
they  least  expect  it.  At  all  events,  the  clouds  of  doubt  are 
constantly  arising  in  the  public  mind  to  darken  their  pictorial 
horizon.  They  may  esteem  themselves  fortunate  if  criticism, 
which  by  some  inexplicable  modern  process  invariably  be¬ 
comes  more  luminous  as  it  recedes  from  the  era  of  its  subject, 
leaves  them  a  few  pencil-marks  or  dashes  of  the  brush  of  their 
adored  master.  Generally,  the  admiration  of  ages  is  criticised 
away,  until  nothing  is  admitted  but  tolerable  imitation  or  an 
impaired  style.  Ask  two  doctors  the  nature  of  a  disease,  and 
the  probabilities  are  far  more  that  they  will  agree  in  opinion 
than  that  two  professional  picture-dealers  will  coincide  as  to 
even  the  school  of  a  good  painting.  I  have  amused  myself 
more  than  once  in  testing  this  by  asking  their  opinions  on  an 
acknowledged  painting.  The  first  would  decide  it  to  be  de¬ 
cidedly  of  the  Bolognese  school,  for  technical  reasons  that  ap¬ 
peared  incontestable  ;  the  next  comer  would  be  as  sincere  in 
favor  of  some  other  school,  with  an  equally  good  argument ; 
and  so  the  changes  would  be  rung  through  every  variety  of 
generic  art,  leaving  the  anxious  novice  in  most  ungratifying 
uncertainty,  until  he  has  acquired  sufficient  mental  independ¬ 
ence  to  be  satisfied  with  what  is  good  for  its  own  sake,  with¬ 
out  puzzling  his  brains  over  dubious  genealogies  and  the  end¬ 
less  intricacies  of  an  art  which,  in  its  meanest  sense,  is  nothing 
but  deception. 


114 


ITALIAN  SIGHTS  AND  PAPAL  PRINCIPLES. 


Rome,  Florence,  and  Naples  have  long  waged  a  mutual 
warfare  in  regard  to  the  originality  of  certain  pictures.  Lon¬ 
don  glories  in  costly  originals  of  the  Continental  schools  in  her 
National  Grallery,  over  which  John  Bull  periodically  goes  into 
ecstasies,  while  her  best  critics  pronounce  them  to  he  wretched 
forgeries,  underrating  the  real  merits  and  exaggerating  the 
faults  of  their  supposed  authors.  The  Corsini  Gallery  at  Flor¬ 
ence  has  long  boasted  the  Wheel  of  Fortune  of  Michael  An¬ 
gelo,  though  the  most  astute  critics  insist  that  the  Tribune 
alone  has  the  sole  specimen  of  his  easel-painting  in  existence. 
Be  this  as  it  may,  there  are  others  sufficiently  like  their  fa¬ 
ther  to  claim  to  be  his  children.  Recently  a  dealer  has  bought 
at  an  old-clothes  fair,  for  seven  pauls  (seventy-seven  cents),  a 
twin  picture,  which,  being  cleaned,  he  now  brings  forward  to 
dispute  the  palm  of  originality  with  that  of  the  Corsini,  which 
he  pronounces  to  be  a  copy.  Michael  Angelo  could  touch 
nothing  without  stamping  it,  in  a  greater  or  less  degree,  with 
the  power  of  his  genius.  In  the  oil  paintings  that  claim  to 
be  his,  his  contempt  or  indifference  to  this  branch  of  art  are 
equally  shown  ;  for  there  is  not  one  of  them  which,  if  called 
by  another  name,  would  afford  pleasure  from  those  sources 
that  appeal  most  forcibly  to  the  public  mind  in  painting. 


CHAPTER  V. 


CARRIAGES  AND  THE  CASCINE  AT  FLORENCE,  WITH  A  SLIGHT 

DISSECTION  OF  SOCIETY. 

At  Florence,  Fashion  is  an  easy  dame.  She  does  not  de¬ 
mand  much,  but  when  she  speaks  she  must  be  obeyed.  She 
lets  you  alone  while  under  a  roof,  and  has  no  preferences  in 
the  way  of  a  habitation.  You  may  eat  maccaroni  three  times 
a  day,  and  she  does  not  take  it  to  heart.  If  you  lodge  close  to 
the  eaves,  and  are  obliged  to  make  your  nocturnal  ascents  up 
a  narrow  stone  staircase  by  the  light  of  a  pocket  taper,  she 
whispers  it  not  in  Gath,  nor  talks  of  it  at  Askelon.  She  re¬ 
spects  economy  within  doors,  even  to  the  extent  of  pitching 
comfort  out  of  the  windows.  Should  you  shiver  the  winter 
through  over  a  few  half-dead  coals  in  an  earthen  pot,  her  eyes 
see  it  not ;  nor  would  she  take  note  of  your  dress,  were  it  gayer 
than  J acob’s  garment,  or  fouler  than  the  beggar’s  rags,  so  that  it 
be  Worn  within  the  charmed  hour  when  you  are  considered, 
by  a  fiction  of  etiquette,  invisible.  This  laxity  has,  however, 
its  limit.  If  you  do  not  wish  to  be  considered  upon  a  par  in 
social  importance  with  an  Egyptian  mummy,  you  must  circu¬ 
late  with  the  world  after  the  sun  has  warmed  the  eastern 
bank  of  the  Arno.  Fashion  then  summons  her  train  ;  not  on 
foot — for  no  one  walks  in  Florence,  except  by  way  of  paren¬ 
thesis — but  in  carriages. 

Two  things,  then,  are  essential  to  respectability  ;  an  equi¬ 
page,  and  a  box  at  the  Pergola.  So  long  as  you  do  not  possess 
one  of  these  two,  you  are  without  the  golden  circle — a  mere 


116 


ITALIAN  SIGHTS  AND  PAPAL  PRINCIPLES. 


nobody — though  Croesus  were  your  grandfather,  and  the  blood 
of  Augustus  warmed  your  veins.  Florence  boasts,  in  conse¬ 
quence,  the  most  numerous,  stylish,  and,  at  the  same  time, 
cheapest  turn-outs  of  any  capital.  It  is  unnecessary  to  own  a 
carriage,  when  fifty  dollars  per  month  provides  not  only  one 
with  a  fine  span  of  horses,  but  coachmen  and  footmen  in  a 
livery  of  your  choice  in  addition.  Even  a  whole  stud  of 
horses  does  not  involve  a  ruinous  expenditure. 

Neither  is  a  title  of  nobility  an  insurmountable  affair.  The 
pert  little  town  of  Fiesole,  the  germ  of  Florence,  and  old  when 
even  Rome  was  young,  has  established  itself  in  the  trade  of 
manufacturing  titles  of  nobility,  to  raise  a  fund  for  the  repair  of 
its  roads.  Four  hundred  dollars  will  buy  the  parchment,  title, 
seal,  coat  of  arms,  with  a  genealogy  thrown  in  when  required, 
of  a  count,  baron,  or  other  patent  of  nobility  not  infringing 
upon  the  superior  claims  of  the  families  of  the  Popes,  which 
have  made  princes  almost  as  common  in  Italy  as  generals  in 
the  United  States.  After  all,  the  attraction  is  not  so  very 
great.  One  American,  however,  I  am  told,  has  made  an  in¬ 
vestment  in  this  fancy  stock,  and  with  John  Bull  it  is  not  an 
unknown  weakness. 

An  Italian  cherishes  the  distinctions  of  rank  to  a  degree 
that  makes  him  a  fit  neighbor  to  the  Orientals.  His  vocabu¬ 
lary  of  titles  is  most  sonorous  and  imposing,  but  in  his  eager¬ 
ness  to  pay  court  he  is  apt  to  overshoot  the  mark  to  a  most 
ridiculous  extent  when  in  contact  with  the  Jonathans  of  Amer¬ 
ica.  One  soon  becomes  an  “  illustrious  lord”  in  Italy,  and  the 
commonest  apartment  a  palace,  so  dubbed  by  the  tongues  of 
the  sycophantic  throng,  whose  aim  is  to  explore  your  purse. 
Fools  and  princes,  so  Kendall  says,  are  the  only  individuals 
that  ride  in  the  first-class  cars  in  Germany.  As  Americans 
of  late  have  earned  in  Europe  the  reputation  of  spending 
money  like  both  those  classes,  they  must  not  be  shocked  if 


ITALIAN  SIGHTS  AND  PAPAL  PRINCIPLES. 


117 


their  ears  are  saluted  with  adjectives  in  general  familiar  only 
to  the  latter  personages.  There  is,  however,  a  special  incon¬ 
venience  attending  them  when  at  the  head  of  a  hill.  They 
cost  more  than  even  Jenny  Lind’s  notes. 

Fashion  in  Florence,  it  is  true,  imperatively  demands  car¬ 
riages.  She  likes  to  have  them  do  her  credit,  but  does  not  re¬ 
fuse  a  hack.  The  numbered  Jehus  know  this,  and  as  there 
are  no  side-walks,  or,  where  there  are  any,  they  are  so  narrow 
as  to  throw  one  still  farther  toward  the  middle  of  the  street, 
they  drive  rapidly  among  the  pedestrian  throngs,  aiming,  in 
particular,  to  frighten  the  ladies  or  soil  their  dresses,  so  that, 
in  self-defense,  they  may  be  forced  to  ride.  The  hackmen 
are  the  sturdiest  of  all  the  beggars.  There  are  no  fixed  fares  ; 
custom  gives  about  thirty  cents  the  hour  for  a  fine  open  car¬ 
riage,  and  if  they  can  not  get  that,  they  are  content  to  take 
less.  It  is  amusing  to  watch  with  what  perseverance  they 
will  walk  their  horses  alongside  a  newly-arrived  group  of 
strangers,  following  up  their  quarry,  as  a  pointer  does  his  game, 
until  they  are  fairly  bagged.  Ride  you  must ;  and,  after  all,  it 
is  almost  as  cheap  as  shoe-leather. 

Fashion  has  done  something  more  than  demand  carriages  ; 
she  has  provided  the  loveliest  of  all  drives  for  them — a  sort 
of  rural  exchange,  where  they  all  centre,  from  whatever  quar¬ 
ter  they  may  depart.  Florence,  compared  with  most  capitals, 
is  small — a  mere  tenth  part  of  Paris  ;  yet  she  contrives  to  as¬ 
semble,  on  the  right  sort  of  a  day,  not  less  than  several  hund¬ 
red  carriages,  of  all  kinds,  at  the  Cascine.  Some  pretend  to 
have  counted  fifteen  hundred  on  one  occasion,  but  I  have  nev¬ 
er  seen  half  that  number.  Most  of  these  are  no  vulgar  turn¬ 
outs,  but  equipages  of  every  style  and  fancy,  expressly  got  up 
for  competition  in  taste  and  display  of  thorough-bred  horse¬ 
flesh.  It  is  a  sight  peculiar  to  Florence,  and  to  strangers 
quite  as  attractive,  while  to  citizens  far  more  so,  than  all  her 


118 


ITALIAN  SIGHTS  AND  PAPAL  PRINCIPLES. 


galleries  of  antique  art.  In  its  own  way  it  is  a  school  of  mor¬ 
als  and  manners.  A  friend  of  mine,  thinking,  upon  his  first 
arrival,  to  make  a  nice  display  of  four-in-hand  driving,  went 
up  to  the  Cascine  with  his  bloods,  but  found  himself  but  one  of 
seven  similar  establishments.  It  was  useless  to  think  of  aston¬ 
ishing,  by  any  equestrian  display  or  skill,  the  owners  of  forty 
fancy  horses  and  upward,  drawn  from  the  best  stocks  of  En¬ 
gland,  Germany,  and  Arabia,  with  equipages  of  every  style  of 
elegance,  not  excepting  the  unrivaled  New  York  trotting-wag- 
on,  which  all  over  Europe  maintains  its  superiority  as  the  best 
model  for  grace  and  speed.  The  Cascine  boasts  of  several  of 
these,  all  fine  in  their  way,  with  horses  to  match.  It  owes 
their  introduction  to  a  transatlantic  lion,  now  a  fixture  in  Eu¬ 
rope.  To  him  it  is  indebted,  also,  for  the  most  extraordinary 
vehicle — called  a  drag,  I  believe — ever  contrived  for  pleasure. 
The  body  resembles  a  section  of  a  stage-coach,  got  up  in  a 
coupe  fashion,  with  blinds  to  the  windows,  and  kept  as  close¬ 
ly  shut  as  a  Turkish  harem.  The  interior  of  this  singular  con¬ 
trivance  is  a  perpetual  mystery  to  all  beholders,  and  must  have 
been  originally  Hevised  for  the  airings  of  the  Man  in  the  Iron 
Mask.  The  exterior,  however,  has  no  secrets.  It  is  mounted 
upon  a  heavy  set  of  wheels,  clumsy  we  should  say  in  the 
United  States,  and  well  calculated  to  stand  the  rigors  of 
mountain  roads.  Back  of  the  coupe  portion  is  a  high,  strong 
seat,  occupied  by  two  servants  in  livery.  On  top,  and  chain¬ 
ed  to  it,  are  four  dogs  ;  in  front,  and  higher  still,  much  like  the 
elevated  seats  of  one  of  our  leviathan  sleighs  or  a  circus-wag- 
*  on,  is  another,  occupied  by  the  owner,  who  drives  four  beauti¬ 
ful  and  spirited  black  horses.  There  are  numerous  cupboards 
about  and  underneath  for  baggage,  and,  I  presume,  a  kitchen 
battery,  to  be  used  in  traveling,  while  the  exterior  generally  is 
hung  around  with  spare  whipple-trees,  and  other  duplicate 
portions  of  those  parts  of  the  vehicle  which  were  liable  to  give 


ITALIAN  SIGHTS  AND  PAPAL  PRINCIPLES. 


119 


way,  for  the  readjustment  of  which  a  portable  blacksmith’s 
shop  is  provided,  the  whole  giving  the  vehicle  the  appearance 
of  being  turned  inside  out.  The  entire  carriage  forms  the 
most  extraordinary  combination  of  utility,  oddity,  and  orna¬ 
mental  ugliness  ever  put  on  wheels. 

But,  before  describing  the  lions  of  the  Cascine,  it  is  neces¬ 
sary  to  explain  what  it  is.  In  literal  English,  the  farm-houses 
or  dairies  of  the  Grand  Duke,  but,  in  reality,  the  most  charming 
drive  in  Italy.  They  commence  immediately  outside  of  the 
walls,  by  the  Leghorn  Rail-road  station,  and  extend  along  the 
Arno  for  two  miles.  The  bank  of  the  river  is  laid  out  as  a 
beautiful  walk,  overshadowed  by  magnificent  trees,  among 
which  is  a  superb  species  of  pine,  with  a  clean,  noble  trunk, 
and  top  that  spreads  out  like  an  umbrella.  The  forest  on  this 
side  is  a  narrow  belt,  but  kept  in  fine  order,  and  intersected  by 
the  most  level  and  easy  of  roads,  giving,  for  the  space,  a  charm¬ 
ing  variety  of  drives.  Farther  to  the  right  are  the  extensive 
lawns,  trimmed  in  English  style,  and  contrasting  sweetly  with 
the  bordering  groves.  Among  them  are  interspersed  the  dai¬ 
ries  from  which  Florence  derives  its  purest  supplies  of  milk  and 
butter.  At  intervals,  little  temple-shaped  summer-houses  be- 
stoAV  upon  the  landscape  a  classical  look.  The  eastern  hori¬ 
zon  is  bounded  by  the  Apennine  range  of  mountains,  thickly 
dotted  with  villas  and  villages,  brought  by  the  clearness  of  the 
atmosphere  to  within  an  apparently  very  neighborly  distance. 
The  half-way  point  of  the  drive  is  laid  out  in  a  circle,  the  in¬ 
terior  of  which  forms  a  fine  promenade,  and  a  station  for  the 
military  bands  which  play  on  several  afternoons  of  each  week. 
Around  this  circle  the  carriages  all  gather.  No  orders  are 
given.  The  coachmen  know  that  to  take  a  drive  means  to  g-o 
to  the  Cascine,  and  to  go  to  the  Cascine  is  to  perform  the  tour, 
and  then  join  the  grand  group  to  listen  to  the  music,  chat, 
flirt,  descend  and  walk  along  the  river’s  bank,  or  to  iade  one’s 


120 


IT.'iLIAN  SIGHTS  AND  PAPAL  PRINCIPLES. 


self  with  the  most  fragrant  of  bouquets,  assiduously  proffered  by 
unsentimental-looking  flower-girls  at  prices  that  seem  almost 
of  fabulous  cheapness  in  contrast  with  floral  sales  elsewhere. 
But  with  the  Florentines  flowers  would  appear  to  be  too  vul¬ 
gar  an  attraction,  for  few  but  strangers  display  taste  in  this 
respect.  With  them,  however,  it  can  not  ever  be  said  to  be 
a  matter  of  choice,  for,  like  carriages,  they  must  receive  the 
offered  bouquets  in  self-defense.  By  some  incomprehensible 
singularity,  the  flower-girls  are  among  the  grossest  and  most 
ill-favored  of  the  peasantry  ;  or,  if  they  are  fair  specimens  of 
the  peasantry,  the  rural  Tuscans  are  remarkably  deficient  in 
good  looks.  Even  when  one  has  a  pretty  face,  and  turns  it  to 
profitable  account,  she  runs  the  risk  of  having  it  peeled  by  the 
knife  of  some  jealous  rival.  This  actually  took  place  a  short 
time  since,  because  it  proved  to  its  possessor  worth,  in  the 
sale  of  flowers,  something  more  than  twice  that  of  her  enraged 
and  homely  competitor.  What  do  you  suppose  was  the  sum 
total  of  the  monthly  gains  that  excited  the  one  to  a  deed  that 
sent  her,  or,  rather,  her  agent — for  she  did  it  by  proxy — to 
the  penitentiary,  and  the  other  to  the  hospital  ?  Eleven 
dollars  !  ! ! 

But,  as  I  was  saying,  the  flower-girls  are  as  pertinacious  as 
hack-drivers  or  picture-dealers.  They  do  not  demand  money, 
only  you  must  accept  their  flowers  ;  if  you  will  not  take  them, 
they  arrest  you  by  the  collar,  and  decorate  your  button-hole 
with  a  dainty  bunch,  and  then  slip  modestly  off,  declining  all 
recompense,  knowing  that  bachelor-nature  can  never  long  hold 
its  purse-strings  closed  against  the  language  of  flowers.  This 
they  repeat  every  morning.  If  you  breakfast  at  Doney’s,  the 
Delmonico  of  Florence,  a  fresh  bouquet  is  on  your  table  as 
soon  as  you  are  seated.  If  you  escape  this,  you  are  overtaken 
in  the  street,  or  at  the  Cascine,  and  decorated,  despite  all  mod¬ 
est  resistance,  with  the  infallible  sign  of  a  newly-caught  stran- 


ITALIAN  SIGHTS  AND  PAPAL  PRINCIPLES. 


121 


ger.  After  all,  it  is  a  very  pretty  and  innocent  affair,  barring 
the  advertisement  it  holds  out  of  a  greenhorn  to  be  plucked. 

The  Cascine  is  so  arranged  that  carriages,  horsemen,  and 
pedestrians  have  each  their  distinct  avenues.  Seats  are  plen¬ 
tifully  supplied,  and  also  cosey,  shady  nooks,  most  agreeable 
to  lovers  or  the  recluse.  Why  is  it  that  the  sovereign  peo¬ 
ple  of  America  do  not  sufficiently  regard  their  health  and 
pleasure  to  create  for  themselves  similar  grounds  ?  In  the 
plenitude  of  our  political  wisdom,  we  pity  the  subjects  of  the 
sovereign  princes  of  Europe,  but  we  forget  that  those  said 
despots  throw  open  to  the  masses  galleries,  jDalaces,  and  par¬ 
ticularly  gardens,  such  as  no  private  republican  wealth  can 
ever  hope  to  rival.  The  poor  of  Europe  are  more  liberally 
supplied  in  these  respects  than  the  rich  of  America.  Are  these 
advantages  as  nothing  in  the  scale  of  individual  happiness  ? 

But  to  return  to  the  Cascine,  or,  rather,  to  its  fashionable 
throng.  I  had  driven  twice  around  its  shady  avenue,  wishing 
the  while  that  public  taste  in  America  was  equal  to  the  crea¬ 
tion  of  similar  results,  and  now  found  myself  near  the  centre 
of  the  circle  of  carriages.  The  Austrian  band  was  playing  a 
polka,  to  the  time  of  which  little  children  were  hopping  mer¬ 
rily  on  the  greensward.  A  bright  sun — it  was  in  December 
— warmed  up  the  Arno  and  the  hills.  Although  near  Christ¬ 
mas,  boys  were  wading  in  the  river  ;  ladies  were  slowly 
promenading  in  the  open  air,  sitting  on  the  seats,  or,  in  lazy 
elegance,  half-reclining  in  their  open  carriages.  The  trees 
were  still  well  clothed  with  leaves,  and  the  grass  as  fresh  as 
in  June.  This  sunny  luxuriance  was  in  a  climate  two  degrees 
north  of  Boston.  The  panorama  was  a  brilliant  one.  I  wish 
my  pen  could  place  it  before  the  reader.  Austrian  staff-offi- 
'cers  were  galloping  here  and  there,  showing  off  their  horse¬ 
manship,  and  the  most  tasteful  of  uniforms.  Groups  of  gen¬ 
tlemen  clustered  about  the  oarriages  of  dark-browed  Italian 

F 


122 


ITALIAN  SIGHTS  AND  PAPAL  PRINCIPLES. 


belles,  whose  brilliant  eyes  rather  commanded  than  solicited 
homage.  There  were  worshipers,  too,  at  the  shrines  of  En¬ 
glish,  German,  Russian,  and  French  loveliness.  My  own 
country  furnished  specimens  as  fair  as  any.  Each  was  the 
centre  of  a  little  out-door  reception.  The  toilettes  correspond¬ 
ed  with  the  occasion — as  bright  and  as  varied  as  the  flower¬ 
beds  of  the  Tuileries  in  summer. 

The  scene  was  a  fair  one  to  look  upon — the  more  the  pity 
that  it  was  not  all  harmony  within.  I  had  beside  me  a  com¬ 
panion  deeply  versed  in  Florentine  life,  and,  whether  I  was  in 
the  mood  or  no,  Mephistophiles  like,  he  continued  to  unravel 
in  my  ear  its  Gordian  knot.  Those  of  my  readers  who  disap¬ 
prove  of  any  thing  that  savors  of  scandal,  even  though  that 
frightful  name  be  but  a  reflection  of  the  sadder  truths  or  ludi¬ 
crous  shades  of  society,  will  please  skip  any  remarks  not  to 
their  taste.  For  my  own  part,  T  speak  of  the  world  just  as  I 
find  it.  I  wish  it  were  a  wiser  and  a  happier  one,  but,  such 
as  it  is,  it  is  the  best  that  we  have. 

“  Do  you  see  that  lady,”  said  Mephistophiles  to  me,  “  in  the 
blue  hat,  with  the  unmistakable  air  of  the  Q,uartier  Breda  about 
her  ?  There  she  sits,  in  that  elegant  coupe.  See  how  saucily 
those  young  exquisites  stare  at  her  as  they  pass  along !  Her 
game  flies  higher,  but  she  has  missed  her  swoop,  and  is  going 
back  to  Paris  soon. 

‘‘  Just  look  at  that  carriage  full  of  bulky  English !  heavy 
dames  those,  and  dressed  as  most  English  women  dress,  so  as 
to  conceal  beauty'and  exaggerate  defect.  The  daughters  are 
pretty  enough,  but  see  how  unamiable  they  look — a  thunder¬ 
cloud  gathering  before  the  sun.  Turn  your  eyes  a  bit,  and  de¬ 
tect  the  cause.  They  are  miserable  unless  they  can  outdo 
their  neighbors,  the  Dashaways.  At  this  moment  they  are 
undergoing  the  agonies  of  a  defeat,  for  Lord  Twaddle,  with  his 
foot  condescendingly  placed  upon  the  Dashaways’  carriage- 


ITALIAN  SIGHTS  AND  PAPAL  PRINCIPLES. 


123 


step,  is  saying  saucy  things  to  the  mother,  and  flirting  desper¬ 
ately  with  the  youngest  of  the  girls.  Nature  has  no  charms 
for  such  persons.  Their  happiness  is  made  up  of  hows,  beaus, 
and  badinage.  Just  beyond  them  is  that  fair-haired  Scotch 
clan,  who  so  admirably  represent  the  pride  and  beauty  of  their 
country.  They  come  as  regularly  as  the  sun  to  the  Cascine, 
and  hold  themselves  as  coldly  distant  as  the  moon. 

“  Whose  is  that  sweet  face  next  to  a  mamma  that  looks  wor¬ 
thy  of  such  a  daughter  ?  With  what  becoming  elegance  they 
are  dressed !  ^  They  are  Americans,  and  the  girl  is  to  inherit 
a  fortune  of  a  million,  it  is  said,  but  she  looks  as  retiring  and 
unassuming  as  if  she  had  never  seen  city  life.  How  unlike 
that  dark  beauty  near  her  !  She’s  Italian,  not  yet  sixteen,  but 
married  at  fourteen.  At  twelve  she  professed  herself  blasee 
and  tired  of  the  world  of  fashion.  Like  Marie  Antoinette,  she 
should  retire  to  the  country  and  play  at  milk-maid  to  recruit 
her  exhausted  sensibilities. 

“  Here  comes  the  Grand  Duke  and  his  family.  Q-uite  an 
imperial  turn-out,  with  their  outriders  and  mounted  guard. 
But  they  mingle  very  unceremoniously  with  the  crowd.  They 
have  been  walking  along  the  Arno,  jostled  by  any  one  who 
may  be  unconscious  of  their  rank,  for  there  is  nothing  to  dis¬ 
tinguish  them  except  a  couple  of  footmen,  walking  out  of  ear¬ 
shot  in  their  rear.  This  sort  of  attendance  is  so  common,  that, 
unless  you  know  the  royal  livery,  you  could  not  tell  them  from 
any  of  the  Fiesole  nobility. 

“  The  Florentines  rarely  enter  the  galleries.  To  go  beyond 
the  Cascine  would  be  to  set  out  on  their  travels  through  the 
world.  One  of  the  journals  gave,  not  long  since,  a  list  of  thirty 
names  of  persons  who  had  passed  their  lives  in  Florence  with¬ 
out  once  crossing  the  river  from  the  side  on  which  they  were 
born  to  the  other.  Twenty  minutes,  as  you  know,  is  quite 
sufficient  to  take  a  good  walker  to  the  farthest  extremity  of 


124 


ITALIAN  SIGHTS  AND  PAPAL  PRINCIPLES. 


the  city.  You  may  judge,  then,  of  the  enterprise  of  these  de¬ 
scendants  of  the  proudest  and  fiercest  Republicans  of  Italy — 
those  merchant  princes,  whose  commerce  drew  the  wealth  of 
the  world  into  their  coffers.  Every  thing  now  is  allowed  to 
take  as  much  rest  as  it  pleases  except  the  church-bells ;  their 
tongues  keep  up  a  perpetual  clatter.  Several  hundred,  all 
ding-donging  at  once,  from  four  o’clock  in  the  morning  on  fete- 
days  to  midnight,  is  a  trying  thing  for  the  nerves  in  a  small 
city  like  this.  The  coachmen  have  as  little  rest.  If  they 
sleep  at  all,  it  must  be  on  their  boxes.  Under  the  paternal 
strictness  of  the  Grand  Duke,  every  thing  goes  on  as  regular 
as  clock-work  except  the  clocks  themselves.  There  is  as  lit¬ 
tle  accord  between  them  as  between  Italian  families.  One 
would  suppose  that  they  had  inherited  the  social  feuds  of  their 
fabricators.  They  do  not  even  agree  in  striking.  I  asked  a 
Florentine  one  day  why  they  did  not  set  them  to  rights. 
‘  What  the  devil  does  any  one  want  to  know  of  the  time  in 
Florence  V  was  his  reply.  He  was  quite  right.  Where  there 
is  nothing  to  do  but  to  amuse  one’s  self,  there  is  no  time  but 
the  present. 

“Take  notice  of  that  group  to  your  left.  Magnificent  car¬ 
riages  these  !  not  those  cumbersome  and  stately  old  family 
coaches  covered  with  gold  and  paintings,  but  those  light,  taste¬ 
ful  affairs,  which  make  the  very  horses  proud  of  their  chains. 
Each  represents  a  family  charged  with  centuries  of  names 
splendidly  historical.  A  tinge  of  pride  may  be  pardoned  in 
the  descendants  of  the  Albizzi,  Capponi,  Gherardesca,  Guic¬ 
ciardini,  and  the  Medici,  even  though  wilted  by  despotism  and 
fashion  into  idle  elegants.  I  have  no  sympathy  for  the  Med¬ 
ici,  for,  if  they  suffer,  it  is  by  the  ‘  lex  talionis.’ 

“  Remark  how  aloof  the  Italians  keep  from  the  Austrians ! 
not  all,  but  some.  They  do  not  know  how  to  govern  them¬ 
selves,  yet  they  hate  those  who  save  them  that  trouble.  No 


ITALIAN  SIGHTS  AND  PAPAL  PRINCIPLES. 


125 


Austrian  ever  crosses  their  thresholds.  Some  noble  families 
have  even  abandoned  the  court  because  there  they  must  meet 
their  rulers.  To  speak  to  an  Austrian  is  to  he  estranged  from 
them.  One  lately  told  me,  with  frank  hluntness,  that  stran¬ 
gers  must  choose  between  the  Austrians  and  Florentines  ;  they 
could  not  be  on  good  terms  with  both.  When  you  come  to 
know  the  Tuscan  patois  better,  you  will  appreciate  the  wit  and 
humor  of  the  street  ‘  gamins,’  as  they  mock  the  stolid  G-ermans. 
It  is  like  pouring  oil  upon  the  wounds  of  those  haughty  patri¬ 
cians,  for  other  revenge  than  street  jibes  and  social  isolation  is 
beyond  their  power.” 

Among  so  many  lions  of  the  first  magnitude,  there  was  no 
cessation  of  curiosity.  My  friend  had  barely  time  to  disj)ose 
of  one  before  I  probed  him  upon  another.  His  memory  was 
a  perfect  epitome  of  the  life  within  the  life  about  us.  I  pick¬ 
ed  out  a  couple  of  the  most  distinguished  appearance.  The 
gentleman  was  driving  a  faultless  span  of  black  horses.  He 
was  one  of  the  finest  specimens  of  refined  manly  beauty  I  had 
ever  seen,  perfect  to  a  nicety  in  his  costume,  with  that  unex¬ 
aggerated  tone  in  both  his  mental  and  physical  aspect  that 
marks  the  polished  man  of  the  world.  The  lady  beside  him 
was  his  equal  in  these  respects ;  pale,  unanimated,  and  deli¬ 
cate  even  beyond  the  American  standard  of  female  loveliness. 
Their  “  tiger”  was  the  model  of  his  species.  I  looked  in  vain 
for  a  loophole  for  criticism,  and  at  last  triumphantly  ex¬ 
claimed,  “  There’s  my  pattern  for  a  family  turn-out.  Count 
D’Orsay  might  rival,  but  could  not  excel,  the  chaste  style  of 
their  entire  appearance.  Then,  too,  their  faces  interest  me 
prodigiously.  They  seem  so  well  matched.  Who  are  they  ?” 

“  The  gentleman  is  noble — an  old  family — his  ancestors  have 
left  a  name  in  Italy.  He  is  a  perfect  specimen  of  a  Florentine 
lion.  Our  day  is  his  night — that  is  to  say,  like  the  rest  of 
the  idlers,  he  rises  at  midday  or  after,  dresses  for  the  Cascine, 


12fi  ITALIAN  SIGHTS  AND  PAPAL  PRINCIPLES. 


thence  to  the  Pergola,  to  receptions  and  soirees  at  midnight, 
and  retires  toward  morning.  The  want  of  sufficient  sunlight 
will  explain,  in  him  as  with  others,  the  extraordinary  pale¬ 
ness  of  the  fashionable  Florentines.  Their  education  is  not, 
as  the  French  say,  ‘  tres  fort,’  and  their  chief  passion  is  for 
horses.  With  many,  even  with  princely  incomes,  there  is  little 
comfort  or  hospitality  within  doors,  hut  great  show  without. 

“  The  lady  you  admire  so  greatly  is  a  relative  of  an  emper¬ 
or.  There  has  been  some  difficulty  about  the  ‘  dot,’  and  other 
matters  not  uncommon  in  European  circles.  The  cardinal 
archbishop  who  married  them  patched  up  a  sort  of  peace, 
and  for  a  while  she  and  her  husband  appear  together  in  pub¬ 
lic,  while  at  home  they  live  separate.  But  that  is  the  case 
with  many.  You  may  visit  a  lady  familiarly  for  a  year,  and 
not  make  the  discovery  that  she  has  a  husband.  Do  not  make 
so  vulgar  a  mistake  as  to  suppose  that  every  couple  you  see 
are  the  legitimate  twain.  Matrimony  in  Italy  has  a  very  droll 
signification,  according  to  our  ideas.  But  some  allowance 
should  be  made  where  estates  and  families,  but  not  tastes  or 
inclinations,  are  united.  The  intervention  of  a  friend  becomes 
indispensable  for  harmony.  Hence  the  much-talked-of  ‘  cicis- 
beism,’  or  husband  within  the  husband,  the  veritable  bond, 
while  the  nominal  is  only  a  name.  A  lady  said  to  me,  ‘  What 
would  you  have  us  do  ?  We  must  have  some  one  to  advise 
with,  to  act  for  us,  to  attend  to  all  our  little  wants.’  It  never 
occurred  to  her  that  a  husband  was  the  person  for  those  fa¬ 
miliar  offices.” 

“  But  what  role  do  the  husbands  fill  ?” 

“  That  question,”  said  Mephistophiles,  “  I  will  reply  to  by 
quoting  a  little  dialogue. 

“  ‘  M.  de - ,’  said  the  emperor  to  one  of  his  courtiers, 

‘  they  tell  me  that  you  are  a  cuckold.  Why  have  you  not 
told  me  ?’  ' 


ITALIAN  SIGHTS  AND  PAPAL  PRINCIPLES. 


127 


“  ‘  Sire,’  answered  M.  de  - ,  because  I  believed  it 

neither  interested  my  honor  nor  that  of  your  majesty.’ 

“  Italian  husbands  are  much  of  this  advice.  Fidelity,  and 
even  chastity,  is  estimated,  not  by  the  amount  of  attention  to 
the  external  union,  but  by  the  faith  preserved  toward  the  sec¬ 
ond  ;  or,  in  other  words,  the  liaison  grows  to  be  the  veritable 
marriage.  As  soon  as  the  choice  is  public,  it  becomes  hedged 
about  with  a  morality  which  would  do  credit  to  true  virtue, 
and  is  as  imperative  in  its  requisitions  as  are  our  own  rules 
of  conventional  etiquette.  The  very  fidelity  of  Italian  women 
toward  lovers  proves  their  capability  of  correct  attachments, 
if  national  customs  did  not  force  them  astray.  Many  of  these 
unions,  with  all  their  external  familiarity,  do  not  extend  be¬ 
yond  friendship.  They,  however,  are  being  mitigated,  and 
‘  cicisbeism’  is  not  now  universal.  Don’t  blame  too  severely 
the  warm-hearted  daughters  of  Italy.  Custom  and  careless¬ 
ness  make  them  indifferent  to  what  we  consider  immoral.  I 
am  sorry  to  say  that  the  standard  of  other  women  too  often 
varies  with  every  migration.  Difference  of  latitude  effects  a 

surprising  revolution  in  morals.  Look  at  Mrs. -  and 

Madame - ,  both  from  countries  where  morality  is  taught 

with  the  alphabet.  Yet  here  they  manage  to  slip  from  their 
lawful  lords,  and  taste  the  apple  of  variety,  publicly  too,  and 
are  every  where  well  received,  or  else  I  should  be  silent.  But 
in  Italy  society  does  not  think  it  worth  the  trouble  to  cloak 
its  vices,  or,  I  should  say,  our  customs  are  your  vices.” 

“  Do  these  ladies  go  to  court  ?” 

“  Certainly.  The  truth  is,  that  the  silent  sanction  given  to 
‘  cicisbeism’  makes  sad  breaches  in  the  right  standard  of  mor¬ 
als.  Society  here  is  extremely  latitudinarian  so  long  as  cer¬ 
tain  conventionalisms  are  observed.  As  I  have  said,  a  woman 
is  virtuous  as  she  cleaves  to  her  lover.  To  create  scandal,  she 
must  indulge  openly  in  more  than  one.  You  see  this  couple. 


128 


ITALIAN  SIGHTS  AND  PAPAL  PRINCIPLES. 


and  that,  and  dozens  of  others  that  you  know  about  as  well  as 
1.  Marriage  with  them  is  more  a  treaty  of  separation  than  a 
bond  of  union,  or  if  united,  the  connection,  owing  to  the  in¬ 
tervention  of  a  third  party,  too  often  a  priest,  is  less  to  their 
credit  than  if  they  lived  apart.  I  do  not  think  that  now,  as 
formerly,  parties  stipulate  in  the  marriage  contract  for  the  right 
of  lovers,  but  keener  eyesight  than  mine  might  be  pardoned 
for  becoming  confused  by  the  extraordinary  cross-lights  of  this 
matrimonial  jumble.  As  for  children — why,  legitimacy,  like 
justice,  is  blindfolded — they  are  born,  named,  and  no  ques¬ 
tions  asked.  The  poor  victims  are  ordered  to  marry  by  their 
parents,  which  they  must  do,  just  as  if  they  were  told  to  go  to 
school.  Ten  to  one  they  know  as  little  of  each  other  as  they 
do  of  their  confessors  when  first  subjected  to  their  question¬ 
ings.  If  the  acquaintance  does  not  improve  with  time,  it  soon 
becomes  as  politely  distant  as  that  of  two  friends  about  to 
fight  a  duel.  But  as  new  social  wants  have  been  developed, 
their  solace  explains  those  habits  which  tacitly  acquiesce  in 
the  fact,  or  expect  every  woman  to  be  more  intimate  with 
her  neighbor’s  husband  than  her  own.  This  is  the  whole 
story  in  a  nut-shell.  And  when  you  ask  if  Duke  so  and  so  is 
married,  and  are  told  yes,  but  he  lives  in  one  wing  of  the  pal¬ 
ace  and  the  wife  in  the  other,  perhaps  the  one  at  the  villa 
and  the  other  in  town,  and  that  they  never  meet  except  in 
public,  do  not  look  incredulous.  Many  put  even  a  greater  dis¬ 
tance  than  that  between  them.  Yonder  elegant  noble,  so  at¬ 
tentive  to  that  lady  beside  him,  receives  a  handsome  annuity 
on  condition  of  not  coming  nearer  to  his  wife  than  he  is  at 
present ;  that  is  to  say,  some  hundreds  of  miles. 

“  There  drive  by  the  descendants  of  a  king  of  Poland,  and 
heirs  of  one  of  Napoleon’s  most  gallant  generals.  Their  pal¬ 
ace  is  veritably  regal.  The  sons  and  daughter  are  great  mu¬ 
sicians,  composing  and  executing  their  own  performances  suf- 


ITALIAN  SIGHTS  AND  PAPAL  PRINCIPLES. 


129 


ficiently  well  to  please  the  fastidious  ears  of  Italian  critics. 
They  performed  at  the  Opera  at  Boulogne  with  great  applause, 
and  retired  under  a  shower  of  bouquets.  But,  as  they  distrib¬ 
uted  the  tickets  gratis,  perhaps  the  praise  savored  a  trifle  of 
thanks. 

“  That  old  lady,  with  an  ocean  of  rouge  on  her  cheeks,  now 
the  Princess - ,  was  formerly  the  wife  of  a  Roman  me¬ 

chanic.  The  prince  fancied  her  charms,  and  she  his  money 
and  titles.  A  bargain  was  soon  struck,  and  the  carpenter’s 
spouse  became  the  mother  of  princes — and  a  good  mother  she 
made.  At  last  the  carpenter  was  good-natured  enough  to  die, 
and  his  wife  became  a  legitimate  princess  by  the  superfluous 
ceremony  of  marriage.  It  is  said  in  society  here  that  her  son 
remarked  to  a  friend  on  that  ceremony,  when  asked  to  go  else¬ 
where,  ‘  Excuse  me  ;  you  know  I  am  engaged  to  attend  my 
mother’s  marriage!’ 

“  It  is  wholesome  for  your  republican  eyes  to  look  occasion¬ 
ally  into  the  morale  of  the  titles  they  gaze  upon  so  wistfully. 
Aristocratic  vices  are  great  levelers  of  patrician  principles. 
We  hold  up  the  Socialists,  with  their  doctrine  of  ‘  marriage  is 
robbery,’  as  the  great  bugbears  of  the  age.  But  with  them  it 
is  but  an  empty  theory,  while  many  of  the  nobles  who  are  per¬ 
petually  crying  ‘  stew-boy’  to  the  people  against  the  Socialists 
on  account  of  their  disorganizing  doctrines,  are  actually  ex¬ 
emplifying  in  their  own  persons  the  most  pernicious  one  of  all. 
Human  nature  is  like  that  crooked  stick  we  read  about,  that 
was  constantly  turning  over  in  the  vain  pursuit  of  an  easy 
position. 

“  Here  drives  up  the  Duke  of - ,  a  dashing,  wild  young 

fellow,  and  fond  of  scrapes  of  all  sorts.  See,  he  does  not  wait 
to  descend  by  the  steps,  but  jumps  over  the  back  of  his  car¬ 
riage.  He  is  married  to  the  sister  of  King - ,  a  woman 

possessed  of  many  virtues  and  exemplary  patience,  though  the 

F  2 


130 


ITALIAN  SIGHTS  AND  PAPAL  PRINCIPLES. 


publio.  will  have  it  that  the  wind  does  not  always  blow  fair  in 
their  palace.  The  newspaper  talk  has  been  of  a  divorce,  but 
it  is  nothing  but  talk,  for  they  live  as  comfortably  together  as 
their  rank  will  let  them.  She  is  an  angel  of  mercy  to  the 
poor.” 

“  Who  are  those  handsome  young  fellows,  driving  so  rapid¬ 
ly  in  those  elegant  dog-wagons,  with  those  matchless  black 
horses  ?” 

“  The  first  couple  are  Greek  exquisites  and  princes — dwarf¬ 
ish  Alcibiadii — their  talent  running  chiefly  to  dress  and  horse¬ 
flesh  from  sheer  necessity  of  idleness.  The  others  are  the 
princely  *  *  *^  fast  competitors  in  the  same  line,  and  lovers  of 
the  chase.  They  have  an  old  father  of  upward  of  eighty,  who 
knows  how  to  keep  his  house  and  lineage  in  order.  His  pos¬ 
sessions  are  scattered  all  the  way  from  Sicily  to  Trieste.  He 
has  a  deep  head  and  purse.  Napoleon  made  him  a  Council¬ 
or  of  State,  the  Pope  a  senator,  and  the  Grand  Duke  his  em¬ 
bassador  to  Naples  when  he  sent  to  that  court  to  solicit  the 
hand  of  the  present  Grand  Duchess.  He  accepted,  conditioned 
upon  paying  the  expenses  of  the  embassy  himself,  and  he 
made  it  a  second  ‘  field  of  gold.’ 

“  Do  you  see  that  lout  ?  He  bears  an  honored  name,  and 
honors  it  so  greatly  as  to  consider  it  an  equivalent  for  lack  of 
brains.  He  divides  his  attention  between  the  bottle  and  low 
women.  But  do  not  take  him  as  a  type  of  the  male  Floren¬ 
tines  of  good  family.  If  they  are  not  what  the  world  expects, 
it  is  their  misfortune  rather  than  their  fault.  It  is  their  disad¬ 
vantage  to  be  overwhelmed  by  the  greatness  of  their  ancestry. 
Commercial  enterprises  and  industrial  pursuits  are  interdicted 
to  them  by  the  inexorable  laws  of  caste.  Army  and  navy 
there  are  none,  or  next  to  none.  The  Church,  to  the  non-re¬ 
ligious,  is  rather  a  cloak  for  vice  than  a  school  of  religion. 
There  is  nothing  free  to  them— not  even,  as  we  have  seen. 


ITALIAN  SIGHTS  AND  PAPAL  PRINCIPLES. 


131 


marriage.  Their  country  is  a  conquered  province.  Politics 
are  forbidden  fruit,  with  the  bayonet  and  guillotine  to  hedge 
it  round.  Is  it  surprising,  then,  that  they  should  degenerate 
into  elegant  idlers,  and  prefer  cards  to  books,  horses  to  the 
sciences  ?  There  are  among  them  talents  and  spirit.  Many 
fought  bravely  for  the  emancipation  of  Tuscany  during  the 
Hevolution.  They  groan  in  heaviness  of  spirit  at  the  degra¬ 
dation  of  Italy.  One  said  to  me  lately  that  he  should  be  proud 
to  be  an  Englishman  or  an  American,  but  he  was  ashamed  to 
be  an  Italian.  If  they  are  ignorant,  it  is  because  the  govern¬ 
ment  supervises  education  and  the  press,  so  that  nothing  that 
bears  not  its  stamp  of  orthodoxy  shall  penetrate  their  minds. 
Poor  fellows  !  with  natures  fitted  to  make  them  the  equals — 
nay,  the  superiors — of  other  races,  they  are  crushed  under  a 
load  that  no  humanity  would  be  proof  against.  Worse  than 
all,  no  ray  of  hope  brightens  their  horizon.” 

“  Who  is  that  man  with  such  a  thin,  fierce  face,  white  hair, 
and  long  mustaches,  which  he  is  constantly  twirling  ?  He 
looks  about  him  with  a  suspicious,  uneasy  glance.” 

“  That  is  Field-marshal  Haynau,  of  Hungarian  notoriety. 
He  is  living  here  incognito.  He  calls  himself  an  abused  man, 
both  by  the  press  and  his  government ;  for,  as  he  told  a  friend 
of  mine,  he  never  ordered  women  to  be  whipped,  though  the 
laws  of  Austria  required  it.  ‘  They  say,’  he  added,  ‘  that  I 
am  a  cruel  man ;  but  it  is  not  so.  I  am  a  soldier,  and  have 
lived  all  my  life  in  camps,  and  have  the  rough  habits  of  a  sol¬ 
dier,  but  I  never  committed  any  cruelty  not  required  by  my 
position.  I  have  friends  who  love  me  dearly,  and  there  is  not 
another  general  as  popular  as  I  am  with  the  army.’  His  friends 
assert  that  the  Austrian  government  used  him  for  their  own 
purposes  in  Hungary,  and  then  sacrificed  him  to  the  public 
opinion  of  Europe  ^s  a  sort  of  scape-goat  for  their  own  sins. 
Others  say  that  he  is  an  obstinate  and  troublesome  officer  ;  on 


132 


ITALIAN  SIGHTS  AND  PAPAL  PRINCIPLES. 


one  occasion  hanging  eighteen  Hungarians  that  the  govern¬ 
ment  wished  to  spare,  and,  on  being  reprimanded,  allowing 
as  many  more  to  go  free  that  they  wished  to  have  executed. 
However  that  may  be,  he  walks  and  acts  like  a  man  conscious 
that  he  is  under  the  ban  of  public  opinion,  and  that  it  is  a 
weightier  load  than  he  can  well  bear. 

“  But  I  tire  you.  We  will  pass  a  few  more  lions  in  review, 
and  drive  home,  for  it  is  not  wholesome  to  be  out  on  the  Cas- 
cine  after  sunset.  See,  the  old  Duke  de - sets  the  exam¬ 

ple.  He  is  the  heir  of  the  wiliest  of  diplomats,  by  whose 
code  a  mistake  was  a  graver  error  than  a  fault.  Did  you  ever 
see  a  man  of  his  age  in  a  better  state  of  preservation  ?  His 
toilet  is  a  study.  Strip  him,  and  the  change  would  be  sur¬ 
prising.  There  goes,  too,  a  lady  of  equal  age,  and  one  who  has 
done  you  Americans  a  world  of  good  by  her  abuse.  She  en¬ 
joys  high  consideration,  in  consequence,  among  the  English. 
Indeed,  all  Americans  who  know  her  respect  her  talents  and 
thank  her  for  her  criticisms.  She  is  the  famous  Mrs.  Trol¬ 
lope,  now  enjoying  here  the  fruits  and  honors  of  her  industri¬ 
ous  and  clever  literary  career. 

“  That  family,  divided  between  a  carriage  and  horseback,  is 
Charles  O’Malley’s,  or,  in  other  words,  the  wife  and  daughters 
of  that  prince  of  Irish  wit  and  humor,  Charles  Lever.  He 
sports  fine  horses,  and  is  a  capital  fellow,  as  amusing  in  con¬ 
versation  as  he  is  entertaining  in  books.  He  should  go  to 
America,  to  keep  you  serious  Republicans  in  a  roar  of  laugh¬ 
ter,  by  way  of  enlivening  your  blood.  That  dreamy  young 
man,  so  intimate  with  him,  is  a  son  of  England’s  greatest  lit¬ 
erary  lion.  He  is  secretary  to  his  uncle,  the  British  embassa¬ 
dor,  and  has  inherited  all  of  his  father’s  talent. 

“  That  stout,  handsome  man,  leaning  on  his  cane,  is  the 
prince  of  harmony,  Rossini,  who,  with  fifty^  thousand  a  year, 
fears  that  poverty  is  coming  upon  him  like  a  strong  armed 


ITALIAN  SIGHTS  AND  PAPAL  PRINCIPLES. 


133 


man.  And  now  for  the  greatest  lion  of  all — that  magnificent- 
looking  fellow,  seven  feet  high,  with  the  proportions  of  one 
of  Michael  Angelo’s  statues.  He  is  a  mechanic,  and  for  a  pen¬ 
sion  of  five  pauls  (fifty-five  cents)  per  day,  has  sold  his  skele¬ 
ton  to  the  Academy  of  Medicine.  They  have  bargained  that 
he  is  not  to  leave  Florence  ;  hut  as  he  bids  fair  to  live  a  half 
century  more,  his  hones  will  cost  them  dear,  and  few  of  the 
present  generation  will  see  them.  They  call  him  the  living 
skeleton,  by  virtue  of  the  bond.  There  is  one  other  such  a 
giant  at  Pisa,  a  shrewder  chap,  who  has  sold  his  frame  to  two 
different  corporations.  Won’t  there  be  a  rattling  among  the 
dry  bones  when  the  two  powers  seek  to  enforce  possession  ? 

“  If  the  Italians  needs  must  have  masters,  I  am  glad  that 
they  send  them  such  fine-looking  specimens  of  the  warrior 
tribe  as  we  find  here.  Their  uniform  does  much  for  them, 
still  it  would  be  difficult  to  find  more  well-made,  good-looking 
men  elsewhere.  There  trots  by  the  Prince  L - ,  the  Austri¬ 

an  general-in-chief,  a  genuine  St.  George.  He  looks  like  a 
hard  foe  and  a  dare-devil  friend.  A  chivalrous,  gallant  soldier 
all  account  him.  There  are  more  reasons  than  grow  out  of 
politics  why  the  jealous  Italians  should  hate  their  handsome 
conquerors. 

“  You  perceive  that  the  Cascine  still  boasts  of  a  respectable 
herd  of  lions,  mingling  here  in  peaceful  pastime.  The  burgher 
citizens  gaze  admiringly  upon  the  brilliant  throng,  but  rarely 
attempt  to  cross  the  line  of  rank.  They  bring  their  families 
to  see,  but  not  to  make  a  part  of,  the  show.  An  American  or 
Englishman,  in  their  eyes,  has  not  much  to  boast  of  in  way  of 
blood,  but  he  looms  up  in  their  vision  like  another  Nebuchad¬ 
nezzar’s  image,  all  made  of  gold.  Heretical  though  the  metal 
be,  he  is  not  unwilling  to  worship  it,  and  much  of  his  extra¬ 
ordinary  civility  can  be  traced  to  the  power  of  lucre. 

“  The  Cascine  has  the  power  of  loadstone.  The  needle  of 


134 


ITALIAN  SIGHTS  AND  PAPAL  PRINCIPLES. 


fashion  turns  to  it  from  every  quarter  of  Florence,  and  as  Tus¬ 
cany  has  been,  until  recently,  the  home  of  distinguished  exiles, 
it  can  boast  of  having  sheltered  within  its  palaces  at  one  time 
more  great  titles,  if  not  names,  than  any  other  pleasure-grounds 
of  Europe.  A  few  years  since  it  might  have  claimed  cousin- 
ship  with  Napoleon’s  celebrated  pit  full  of  kings.  Here  could 
be  seen  the  Count  Saint  Lew,  ex-King  of  Holland  ;  the  Prince 
of  Montfort,  ex-King  of  Westphalia;  the  Duke  of  Lucca,  ex- 
King  of  Etruria ;  Madame  Christophe,  ex-Clueen  of  Hayti ; 
the  Poniatowski’s,  descendants  of  the  King  of  Poland ;  some 
sprouts  from  the  magnificent  line  of  the  Medici ;  and  the 
Prince  of  Syracuse,  an  ex- viceroy  of  Sicily.  A  tolerable  crowd 
of  dethroned  heads.” 

With  such  entertaining  discourse  my  friend  enlivened  our 
way  back  to  town,  bestowing  upon  me  some  characteristic  in¬ 
formation  or  piquant  anecdote  of  each  notable  name  or  title  as 
they  proudly  swept  along  the  beautiful  avenue.  It  was  an  in¬ 
teresting  accompaniment  to  an  agreeable  picture.  Such  as  I 
could  remember  I  have  given,  but  if  my  readers  would  enjoy 
it  as  1  did,  let  them  come  and  take  their  places  in  the  pano¬ 
rama.  Mephistophiles  still  watches  over  the  spectacle  with 
his  good-humored  cynicism,  and  I  will  bespeak  for  them  the 
favor  of  his  interpreting  glance.  ‘  ' 

I  had  almost  forgotten  his  last  quiet  probe  at  the  social 
world,  as  the  subject  of  his  tale,  in  all  the  pride  of  aristocratic 
equipages  and  liveries,  came  up.  “  Those  grand  ladies,”  said 
he,  “  are  daughters  of  a  London  sausage-maker.  A  mancEU- 
vring  mother  brought  them  here,  and,  by  the  promise  of  mag¬ 
nificent  dowries,  bought  them  titled  husbands.  By  some  ex¬ 
traordinary  absence  of  mind,  their  Italian  lords  were  simple 
enough  to  sign  the  marriage  contracts  without  the  equivalent 
in  hand,  so  that  they  have  had  the  pleasure  not  only  of  pos¬ 
sessing,  but  supporting  their  wives  ever  since.  There  is  no 


ITALIAN  SIGHTS  AND  PAPAL  PRINCIPLES. 


135 


speculation  more  uncertain  than  these  matrimonial  mesalli- 
,  ances.  They  make  a  terrible  hodge-podge  of  morals  and  soci¬ 
ety.  If  there  he  any  difference  between  them  and  the  Cir-  ' 
cassian  mode  of  supplying  the  wife-market,  it  is  that  in  many 
instances  the  candidates  for  the  nuptial  bed  sell  themselves — 
a  much  greater  ignominy  than  if  sold  without  their  own  con¬ 
sent.  That  dilapidated-looking  marquis,  just  crossing  the  road 
on  foot,  married  a  rich  old  Englishwoman.  The  result  is,  that 
while  he  all  but  starves,  and  endeavors  to  raise  a  loan  for  his 
personal  wants  from  his  friends  upon  the  dubious  security  of 
his  wife’s  death,  she  rides  in  her  coach  and  four,  covered  with 
jewels  and  velvets,  reveling  in  the  eclat  of  her  artfully-secured 
title.  Those  who  play  with  edged  tools — you  know  the  rest.” 


CHAPTER  YI. 


WHAT  A  “sight-seer”  DID  SEE  IN  ONE  DAY. 

If  I  were  called  upon  to  name  the  individual  of  the  human 
species  that  unites  in  his  or  her  person  the  greatest  powers  of 
endurance  with  the  utmost  impatience,  the  most  unflagging 
activity  to  a  body  always  just  ready  to  drop  from  fatigue ;  a 
mind  skeptical  from  its  shallowness,  yet  ready  to  ingulf  entire 
kingdoms  in  its  capacious  maw,  and  to  bolt  miracles  and  rel¬ 
ics  by  scores — in  short,  that  individual  who  combines  in  him 
or  herself  the  most  opposite  qualities,  whether  of  body  or 
mind,  I  should  unhesitatingly  pronounce  that  individual  to  be 
the  modern  “  sight-seer.”  Reader  mine,  has  it  ever  fallen  to 
thy  lot  to  travel  with  one  ?  If  so,  now  that  thy  fatigues  have 
become  reminiscences,  it  may  please  thee  to  renew,  on  paper,- 
thy  self-inflicted  sufierings  of  yore,  when,  impatient  of  home, 
thou  rashly  becamest  a  tourist.  If  not,  reader,  ponder  and  in¬ 
wardly  digest  a  day’s  experience  of  mine,  lest  thou,  too,  in  the 
folly  of  thy  heart,  shalt  say, 

“  John,  pack  my  trunk  ;  to-morrow  I’m  ofT  for  Italy.” 

“  Sight-seeing,”  from  its  original  purpose  of  information,  has 
been  perverted  by  these  traveling  pests  into  a  frigid  duty. 
Nothing  must  be  allowed  to  escape  their  observation  that  has 
attained  the  dignity  of  being  a  “  sight.”  They  neither  study, 
examine,  nor  look.  “  They  have  been  there.”  That  short  sen¬ 
tence  embraces  with  them  equally  the  entire  Rise  and  Fall  of 
the  Roman  Empire,  the  Chinese  Wall,  Mohammed’s  Tomb,  or 
the  hair  of  the  Virgin.  It  has  been  the  fashion  heretofore  for 


ITALIAN  SIGHTS  AND  PAPAL  PRINCIPLES. 


137 


lions  to  swallow  travelers  ;  but  now  travelers  swallow  lions  by- 
scores,  in  one  day.  So  far  is  digestion  from  being  impaired 
by  this  enormous  meal,  it  but  serves  as  a  whet  to  the  appetite 
for  the  succeeding.  There  is  but  one  soft  spot  in  their  con¬ 
science.  Hint  to  them  that  there  is  something  that  they  have 
missed— be  it  but  the  ass’s  jaw-bone  with  which  Samson  slew 
the  Philistines,  an  antediluvian  salt-cellar,  or  an  Etruscan 
tomb — and  their  remorse  is  fearful  to  behold.  True,  some 
will  stoutly  deny  the  possibility  of  there  existing  any  thing 
that  they  have  not  seen ;  others  will  offset  their  loss  by  more 
marvelous  sights  in  the  neighborhood,  and  endeavor  to  over¬ 
whelm  your  discovery  by  the  magnitude  of  their  own  ;  but  it 
is  easy  to  perceive  in  both  that  the  wound  rankles,  and  can 
only  be  cured  by  seeing  for  themselves  also.  The  only  object 
that  such  persons  can  possibly  have  in  view  must  be  a  “  cata¬ 
logue,”  and  the  malicious  pleasure  of  saying  to  the  unsophisti¬ 
cated  tourist  who  travels  really  “  to  see” — but  to  see  and  study 
only  those  objects  which  both  gratify  and  instruct,  believing 
that  to  see  every  thing  is  really  to  see  nothing — “  Oh  !  you 
surprise  me  ;  how  could  you  miss  it  ?  I  assure  you  it  was 
worth  all  the  rest.”  For  my  part,  I  should, like  to  see  every 
thing ;  but  then  I  should  desire  to  have  both  life  and  memory 
augmented  to  tenfold  their  present  capacity. 

The  gender  of  these  “  sight-seers”  is  both  male  and  female. 
What  is  the  most  singular,  neither  age,  infirmity,  nor  other 
evils  to  which  human  flesh  is  heir,  have  the  slightest  effect  in 
modifying  this  passion.  Even  delicacy  is  often  discarded  as 
inconvenient.  As  for  health,  that  poor  orphan  must  take 
care  of  itself.  ‘‘  To  see”  is  the  entire  creed — to  know,  re¬ 
member,  or  understand,  are  indifferent  points. 

The  necessities  of  this  class  have  created  a  dozen  other 
classes — parasites  of  the  worst  and  most  annoying  character — 
who  effectually  contrive  to  destroy  all  the  comfort  and  pleas- 


138 


ITALIAN  SIGHTS  AND  PAPAL  PRINCIPLES. 


ure  the  modest  seeker  of  knowledge,  or  lover  of  association, 
otherwise  might  have.  I  speak  of  the  race  generally,  and 
class  them  as  guides,  ciceroni,  coachmen,  donkey-drivers,  vend¬ 
ers  of  prints  and  antiquities,  couriers,  inn-keepers,  showmen, 
valets,  door-keepers,  and  beggars  of  every  quality.  All  these 
are  purse-leeches,  united  in  a  common  league  to  defraud  and 
extort.  But  the  depletion  of  coin  is  the  least  of  their  evils. 
Better,  by  far,  is  it  to  fall  among  the  savages  of  the  American 
deserts,  or  to  be  surrounded  with  wild  animals,  than  to  be  in 
the  midst  of  these  human  wolves.  The  more  they  are  fed, 
the  worse  they  snarl  and  bite.  Unsusceptible  of  gratitude, 
they  are  proof  against  generosity.  Like  cormorants,  every 
thing  is  food  for  their  maws  ;  and  with  the  baseness  peculiar 
only  to  human  nature,  they  fawn  upon  those  they  fear,  and 
mock  at  those  they  gull. 

I  shall  select  one  only  out  of  the  many  similar  days’  experi¬ 
ence  that,  thanks  to  the  system  introduced  by  “  sight-seers,” 
have  now  become  the  common  lot  of  travelers  on  classic  soil. 
By  the  time  my  readers  have  followed  me  through  that  day’s 
labor,  they  will  have  come  to  the  conclusion  that  all  play  and 
no  work  is  not  the  fate  of  tourists  who  have  been  so  unfortu¬ 
nate  as  to  link  their  fortunes  to  those  of  a  universal  sight¬ 
seer. 

One  of  these  terrible  beings,  of  the  female  sex — the  mania 
with  them  is  even  worse  than  with  the  male — had  taken  us  in 
charge  for  the  day.  In  addition  to  her  all-seeing  and  omnis- 
cious  qualities,  she  was  tormented  with  an  insatiable  desire 
for  system,  and  an  incurable  propensity  to  lecture  ;  so  that  we 
were  called  upon  to  look  and  listen,  at  the  same  moment,  aft¬ 
er  the  most  orthodox  manner  possible,  of  the  most  skillful  of 
all  the  mighty  lion-hunters  that  yearly  do  the  “  grand  tour.” 
“  Us”  made  a  party  as  unfavorable  as  can  well  be  conceived 
for  the  appreciation  of  the  talents  of  our  anomalous  Nimrod. 


ITALIAN  SIGHTS  AND  PAPAL  PRINCIPLES. 


139 


It  consisted  of  a  young  lady,  who  much  preferred  youthful 
beaus  to  old  ruins  ;  a  fashionable  matron,  who  would  like  to 
see  what  fashionable  people  went  to  see — but  in  as  ladylike  a 
manner  as  possible,  and  who  much  preferred  the  use  of  her 
own  tongue  to  that  of  another  ;  a  young  gentleman,  to  whom 
every  thing  but  cards,  and  suppers,  and  talking  were  unmiti¬ 
gated  bores  ;  and  your  humble  servant,  who  went  because  it 
would  have  been  so  stupid  to  have  staid  behind.  The  local¬ 
ity  was  Naples  ,  the  hour  of  starting,  as  soon  as  the  coffee  was 
swallowed  ;  and  the  conveyance,  a  comfortable  carriage,  with 
three  horses,  covered  with  innumerable  bells,  that  jingled  mer¬ 
rily  as  we  rapidly  sped  over  the  level  pavements. 

Our  first  station  was  Yirgil’s  Tomb,  at  the  entrance  of  the 
Grotto  of  Pausilipo.  It  is  in  a  garden,  midway  up  the  hill 
which  commands  so  magnificent  a  view  of  the  Bay  of  Naples. 
This  was,  at  all  events,  worth  seeing ;  so  was  the  tomb,  for 
those  whose  faith  has  not  been  destroyed  by  antiquarians.  It 
is  a  nondescript  stone  building,  of  a  cylindrical  shape,  sur¬ 
mounted  by  a  dome,  with  nothing  to  remind  one  of  the  poet 
except  a  modern  inscription.  We  had  four  volunteers  to  show 
us  the  gate  of  the  garden,  directly  before  our  eyes  ;  another 
insisted  upon  being  our  guide  on  a  path  which  as  plainly  led 
to  the  tomb  as  Broadway  does  to  Union  Square  ;  then  an  own¬ 
er  of  the  lot  joined  in  the  procession ;  lastly,  not  to  mention 
the  usual  assault  of  beggars,  appeared  the  guardian  of  the 
tomb,  with  his  key,  to  show  us  how  empty  and  dark  it  is  with¬ 
in — each  of  whom  clamored  for  hucksheesh  with  an  eagerness 
worthy  of  Bedouins. 

I  know  nothing  within  the  range  of  sights  that  more  belies 
its  name,  and  puts  to  flight  every  poetic  and  romantic  asso¬ 
ciation,  than  the  so-called  Grotto  of  Pausilipo.  This  grotto  is 
a  tunnel,  half  a  mile  long,  twenty-two  feet  broad,  and  some 
eighty  feet  high,  cut  through  the  hill  to  form  a  subterranean 


140 


ITAIJAN  SIGHTS  AND  PAPAL  PRINCIPLES. 


road,  by  which  the  distance  to  Pozzuoli  is  materially  shorten¬ 
ed.  It  is  an  ancient  affair,  an  antiquity  in  the  days  of  Seneca, 
who  thought  it  worth  mentioning.  But,  in  comparison  with 
modern  railroad  tunnels,  this  ancient  bore  is  the  work  of  pig¬ 
mies,  particularly  as  the  rock  is  as  easily  cut  as  ice.  There  is 
a  petty  chapel  at  the  entrance,  excavated  out  of  the  hill-side, 
the  station  of  a  dirty,  savage-looking  hermit,  who  waylays  ev¬ 
ery  carriage  with  his  frightful  gestures  and  screams  for  alms. 
The  grotto  is  the  main  road  to  Baia3,  now,  as  formerly,  a  crowd¬ 
ed  thoroughfare  for  carriages,  foot-passengers,  and  droves  of 
animals.  Every  one  who  ventures  through  undergoes  a  fear¬ 
ful  purgatory  of  unwholesome  air,  lamp-smoke,  dust,  and 
countless  other  annoyances,  before  emerging  to  daylight  and  a 
filthy  suburb  of  Naples.  The  road  is  good,  however,  and  soon 
takes  one  into  the  midst  of  vineyards  and  other  vegetation. 

Before  reaching  the  Lake  d’Agnano  it  becomes  circuitous 
and  sandy,  being  a  by-road.  This  lake,  like  all  others  in  the 
vicinity,  is  an  old  crater,  which  nature,  with  a  love  of  change 
quite  worthy  of  a  woman,  has  emptied  of  fire  only  to  fill  it 
with  water.  But  there  is  fire  near  by,  and  plenty  of  it  too, 
judging  from  the  steam  cracks  in  the  earth,  and  the  sulphur¬ 
ous  fumes  which  impregnate  the  atmosphere.  Before  reach¬ 
ing  the  lake  we  were  snatched  up  by  a  guide,  who,  pointing  to 
the  lake,  gravely  informed  us  that  it  was  a  lake — next,  that 
the  bath-house  was  a  bath-house — consigning  us  at  the  door 
to  another,  who  ushered  us  into  various  rudely-built  chambers, 
from  the  sides  and  floors  of  which  sulphurous  vapors  ascended 
with  all  the  force  of  a  young  Tartarus.  These  baths  have  been 
in  use  for  thousands  of  years  for  the  destruction  of  rheumatism. 
They  have  an  alternate  action  with  Vesuvius,  growing  hotter 
and  more  copious  in  their  discharges  as  Vesuvius  becomes 
quiet.  In  their  rear  are  the  remains  of  one  of  the  numerous 
villas  belonging  to  Lucullus. 


ITALIAN  SIGHTS  AND  PAPAL  PRINCIPLES. 


Ml 


At  a  short  distance  to  the  right  is  the  “  Grotta  del  Cane,” 
where  unhappy  dogs  are  doomed  to  daily-renewed  deaths  for 
the  philosophic  gratification  of  pitiless  visitors.  This  grotto  is 
merely  a  small  cavity  in  the  hill,  scarcely  large  enough  for  a 
man  to  enter,  and  closed  by  a  wooden  door,  to  which,  of  course, 
was  attached  its  keeper.  A  pretty  little  dog,  of  a  mongrel- 
spaniel  look,  had  followed  us,  without  much  reluctance,  to  this 
cave,  though  seemingly  aware  of  the  fate  in  store  for  it.  The 
master  of  ceremonies  asserted,  as  was  natural,  that  the  experi¬ 
ment  was  harmless  to  the  dog ;  hut  if  a  human  being  can 
not  breathe  with  impunity  carbonic’  acid  gas  until  it  causes 
convulsions,  neither  can  a  dog.  The  experiment  is  a  cruel 
one,  and  we  were  hard-hearted  enough  to  consent  to  it.  The 
keeper  held  the  dog  by  his  legs,  with  his  face  toward  the 
ground,  from  which  issued  the  mephitic  gases.  He  turned 
his  eyes  piteously  toward  us,  and  yet  seemed  to  take  a  morbid 
pleasure  in  the  fatal  draught.  In  less  than  a  minute  his  limbs 
were  convulsed  ;  in  another  minute  life  would  have  been  ex¬ 
tinct,  but  the  keeper  withdrew  him,  and  laid  him  upon  the 
grass  in  the  fresh  air.  The  recovery  from  this  semi-death 
must  be  more  painful  than  its  previous  endurance,  for  the  poor 
animal  gasped,  and  was  evidently  in  torture.  A  few  minutes 
brought  him  entirely  to — languid,  but  not  without  some  ani¬ 
mation — for  he  made  an  attempt  to  frisk  about.  A  moment 
after,  he  came  to  me  and  licked  my  hand. 

I  inwardly  vowed  that  no  dog  should  again  be  immolated 
for  my  sake.  A  lighted  torch,  held  close  to  the  ground,  was 
immediately  extinguished.  It  was  a  hopeless  effort  to  at¬ 
tempt  to  discharge  a  pistol  within  its  influence.  I  breathed 
it  for  a  second,  and  became  so  dizzy  and  faint,  with  such  a 
painful  sensation  at  the  stomach,  that  I  was  but  too  glad  to 
withdraw,  without  farther  experience  of  what  the  poor  brute 
must  have  suffered. 


142 


ITALIAN  SIGHTS  AND  PAPAL  PRINCIPLES. 


A  cold  boiling  spring,  as  it  is  termed,  close  by,  completed, 
as  we  supposed,  the  sights  of  this  lake  ;  but  another  guide 
made  his  appearance,  and  insisted  that  he  had  charge  of  a  cu¬ 
riosity  worth  them  all.  To  miss  nothing,  we  followed  him. 
He  led  us  to  a  newly-construeted  grotto,  opened  the  door,  and 
ushered  us  in.  This  grotto  covered  a  spring  or  fountain  of 
ammoniacal  gas,  which  is  inhaled  by  consumptives.  Follow¬ 
ing  his  example,  we  bent  ourselves  toward  the  floor,  and  lap¬ 
ped  up  with  our  hands  mouthsful  of  this  not  unpleasant  air. 
Its  first  efleet  was  somewhat  exhilarating,  but  it  should  be 
breathed  only  with  great  caution.  A  frog,  placed  on  the  floor, 
made  at  first  desperate  attempts  to  escape.  Gradually  his 
limbs  became  motionless,  and  in  three  minutes  he  was  dead. 
In  the  half  hour  that  we  passed  at  this  lake  we  had  encoun¬ 
tered  five  guides  or  guardians — disbursed  among  them  nine 
francs — run  through  the  usual  gauntlet  of  beggars — been  steep¬ 
ed  in  hot  sulphur,  drugged  with  carbonic  acid  vapors,  and  made 
light  headed  with  ammoniacal  gas — an  experience,  one  would 
have  supposed,  quite  sufficient  for  an  entire  day,  though  it 
proved  but  the  initiative  ceremonies  of  ours. 

From  the  Lago  d’Agnano  we  drove  to  Pozzuoli,  along  the 
new  beach  road,  affording  on  one  side  fine  sea-views  of  the 
Bay  of  Naples,  and  on  the  other  an  occasionally  almost  over¬ 
powering  stench.  Indeed,  Pozzuoli,  or  Puteoli,  as  it  once  was 
called,  derives  its  name  from  its  fetid  odors,  which  do  not  grow 
any  sweeter  from  age. 

At  the  entrance  of  this  ancient  town,  the  onslaught  made 
upon  us  was  terrible.  Guides  eharged  upon  us  in  scores, 
eatching  hold  of  the  carriage,  and  even  seizing  upon  the  wheels 
to  arrest  our  progress.  Beggars,  whose  entire  capital  consist¬ 
ed  of  broken  or  maimed  limbs,  crutches,  sores  disgustingly  ex¬ 
posed  to  public  view,  and  every  species  of  natural  deformity, 
and  acquired  impudence  and  importunity,  chanted  their  cease- 


ITALIAN  SIGHTS  AND  PAPAL  PRINCIPLES. 


143 


less  whining  chorus  in -our  ears.  “Charity,  charity!  your 
excellencies,  charity !  Beautiful  ladies,  for  the  love  of  the 
holy  Madonna,  give  us  something,  and  the  saints  will  bless 
you  !”  “  Do  you  want  a  guide  ?”  “  Do  you  want  a  donkey  ?” 

“  Here’s  a  bronze  Mercury,  a  veritable  antique,  your  excellen¬ 
cy,  just  dug  up!”  shouted  a  vender  of  antiquities,  waving  his 
clever  imitation  of  the  classic  idol  in  the  air  to  attract  observ¬ 
ation.  “Look  at  the  beautiful  relic,  your  excellency!”  cried 
another  ;  “  one  dollar  only,”  at  the  same  moment  endangering 
my  face  by  a  shapeless  mass  of  metal,  covered  with  verdigris, 
which  he  thrust  almost  into  my  eyes.  Ragged  and  dirty  ur¬ 
chins,  hut  with  fine  faces"  and  waggish  tongues,  swelled  our 
cortege,  and  made  the  “  confusion  still  worse  confounded”  by 
their  sharp  cries  for  the  smallest  coins.  Mothers,  still  more 
ragged  and  dirty,  bronzed  in  the  sun,  and  hardened  by  poverty 
to  reckless  lying  and  beggary,  snatched  up  their  own  or  their 
neighbor’s  infants,  and  rushed  after  us  in  furious  haste  to  gath¬ 
er  their  share  of  the  spoil.  To  give  or  buy  ofi*  such  a  horde 
was  to  make  each  succeeding  visitor’s  path  more  perilous.  It 
would  have  been  a  bounty  on  vice  and  violence.  Having  been 
furnished  at  Naples  with  the  name  of  a  reliable  guide,  we 
shouted  for  Angelo,  and,  almost  instantaneously,  as  if  he  had 
sprung  from  the  earth,  Angelo  was  upon  the  box,  and  we  un¬ 
der  his  orders.  Seeing  us  a  prize  to  Angelo,  the  besieging 
crowd  gradually  returned  to  their  lair  at  the  outskirts  of  the 
town,  to  await  fresh  arrivals. 

“  Now,  Angelo,”  said  our  lady  patroness,  “  we  wish  to  see 
all  the  sights  of  Pozzuoli,  Baise,  Cumoe,  Misenum,  Solfaterra, 
and  every  thing  else  between  this  and — ”  “  Hell !”  our  exas¬ 

perated  dandy  added,  as  the  prospect  of  the  day’s  work  began 
to  dawn  upon  his  already  half  used-up  faculties.  He  meant 
-“Avernus,”  but  in  his  angry  haste  gave  the  plain  English. 
“  And,  Angelo,  return  to  Naples  by  a  different  route,  and  do 


144 


ITALIAN  SIGHTS  AND  PAPAL  PRINCIPLES. 


not  omit  a  single  ruin  or  interesting  object,”  continued  she, 
not  noticing  the  interruption.  “  Angelo,”  I  added,  “  drive  off 
all  beggars  and  sellers  of  antiques  ;  pay  all  ciceroni,  hire  all 
donkeys,  settle  for  every  thing  yourself ;  and  take  care,  as  you 
value  your  own  pay,  that  no  side  demands  reach  us.”  “  Yes, 
your  excellency,  you  shall  be  well  served,”  replied  Angelo,  de¬ 
lighted  at  the  prospect  of  the  haul  before  him.  I  would  ad¬ 
vise  all  travelers  in  such  straits  as  we  to  do  the  same.  To  be 
cheated  by  one  to  whom  you  have  given  a  carte  blanche  is 
vastly  more  satisfactory  than  to  be  annoyed  by  countless  im¬ 
positions  at  every  step  of  the  way. 

St.  Paul  rested  seven  days  at  Pozzuoli  on  his  voyage  to 
Rome,  but  I  think  it  would  be  difficult  for  any  modern  saint 
to  obtain  even  an  hour’s  rest  in  this  place  since  it  has  become 
a  show  town — a  sort  of  galvanic  grave-yard  of  antiques.  Our 
first  stage  was  the  curious  old  temple  of  Jupiter  Serapis,  the 
titbit  of  geologists,  on  account  of  its  columns,  which  furnish  a 
sort  of  conchological  chronology  of  the  earth’s  movements  ever 
since  their  erection.  It  was  built  more  than  two  thousand 
years  ago,  and  originally,  judging  from  the  numerous  ancient 
baths  around  it,  to  which  the  water  still  has  access — and,  in¬ 
deed,  some  are  still  in  use — it  must  have  been  a  sort  of  relig¬ 
ious  hydropathic  establishment.  When  first  discovered,  in 
1750,  after  its  partial  burial  by  an  earthquake,  it  was  quite 
perfect,  and  might  have  been  made,  at  slight  expense,  the  most 
complete  and  beautiful  relic  of  antiquity.  But  the  kings  of 
Naples,  wanting  its  graceful  columns,  colored  marbles,  and  fine 
statuary  for  their  modern  buildings,  have  reduced  this  temple 
to  the  skeleton  of  its  former  state. 

The  next  antiquity  to  which  our  attention  was  directed 
were  the  immense  piers  of  the  old  mole,  constructed  so  far 
back  that  nobody  can  now  decide  when,  though  they  were  in¬ 
debted  to  the  Roman  emperors  for  repairs.  They  remain  uu- 


ITALIAN  SIGHTS  AND  PAPAL  PRINCIPLES. 


145 


der  the  charge  of  Neptune  ;  and  as  nobody  can  fence  them  in, 
there  was  nothing  to  pay  for  looking  at  them.  Caligula  used 
them  as  a  parting  station  for  his  temporary  bridge  of  boats, 
with  which  he  connected  Baise  with  Pozzuoli. 

Rejoining  our  carriage,  we  took  the  road  to  Cumse,  passing 
every  inch  of  the  way  over  classic,  but  very  dusty  and  heavy 
soil.  On  our  right  were  the  remains  of  the  villa  of  Cicero, 
about  as  interesting  in  present  appearance  as  a  dilapidated 
brick-kiln.  Singularly  enough,  all  that  is  left,  that  is  not  vague 
and  shapeless,  is  a  wine-cellar.  Here  the  Emperor  Hadrian 
died,  and  Cicero  composed  his  Academic  Q-uestions — two  facts 
which,  in  the  way  of  reminiscence,  make  these  ruins  of  more 
interest  than  most  of  the  others  that  so  thickly  strew  this  coast. 

The  road  to  Cumse  took  us  past  Lake  Avernus,  quite  a  pic¬ 
turesque  and  gentle  sheet  of  water,  with  nothing  at  present 
about  it  to  remind  one  of  Virgil’s  Tartarus.  However  noxious 
it  may  once  have  been,  birds  not  only  fly  across  it  now  with 
impunity,  but  alight  upon  its  surface,  and  flsh  find  a  safe  home 
in  its  waters.  But  nature  in  this  region  performs  strange 
freaks,  often  in  a  most  unexpected  manner,  so  that  one  should 
take  heed  how  he  indulges  in  skepticism  as  to  what  does  not 
now  exist  as  described  by  ancient  ocular  authorities.  The 
entire  coast  vibrates  under  the  influence  of  volcanic  action. 
Looking  down  from  the  precipitous  cliffs  at  Bauli,  we  could 
see  the  ruins  of  temples  and  villas  beneath  the  clear  waters. 
The  temple  of  Jupiter  Serapis  had  been  submerged,  and  after¬ 
ward  restored  to  earth  again  by  the  same  fiery  agent.  An 
earthquake  in  1538,  or  more  properly  a  volcanic  eruption,  cre¬ 
ated  in  thirty-six  hours  the  present  Monte  Nuovo,  a  hill  quite 
large  enough,  if  inverted,  to  fill  the  Avernine  Lake.  To  make 
room  for  this  mountain,  the  earthquake  swallowed  up  an  en¬ 
tire  village,  and  destroyed  the  greater  part  of  the  Lucrine 
Lake,  with  the  descendants  of  those  oysters  so  prized  by  Latin 

G 


146 


ITALIAN  SIGHTS  AND  PAPAL  PRINCIPLES. 


poets  and  epicures.  A  classical  lake  would  make  but  a  di¬ 
minutive  mill-pond  in  New  England  ;  but  every  sheet  of  water 
large  enough  to  float  a  boat  is  dignified  in  Europe  with  the 
name  of  lake. 

Angelo  shortly  after  announced  our  arrival  at  the  “  Arco 
Felice,”  a  colossal  gateway  of  old  Cumse,  a  city  so  ancient  as 
to  make  all  others  in  this  vicinity  seem  quite  juvenile  in  con¬ 
trast.  It  has  retained  its  ancient  appellation  for  three  thou¬ 
sand  years.  This  gateway  is  still  in  excellent  preservation, 
and  spans  the  old  paved  street  which  leads  directly  through 
the  heart  of  what  was  once  a  populous  and  important  city,  but 
is  now  a  shapeless  mass  of  ruins,  half  hid  in  vegetation.  An¬ 
tiquarians  sagely  point  out  aqueducts,  temples,  baths,  and  vari¬ 
ous  other  edifices,  which  may  be  so  or  may  not.  They  are 
now  not  worth  the  trouble  of  either  dispute  or  investigation. 
All  this  side  of  the  Bay  of  Naples  is  a  cemetery  of  nations,  the 
ruined  cities  of  which  lie  scattered  about  over  the  soil  like 
the  disinterred  bones  of  an  old  grave-yard.  At  CumsB  recent 
excavations  have  brought  to  light  the  tombs  of  three  distinct 
races,  built  like  the  stories  of  a  house  one  over  the  other,  after 
the  existence  of  each,  in  its  turn,  had  been  apparently  forgotten 
by  its  successor.  The  topmost  stratum  consists  of  the  narrow 
abodes  of  the  old  Romans  ;  beneath  this  we  find  the  tombs 
of  the  Greek  colonists  ;  underneath  these,  in  some  instances 
sixty  feet  below  the  present  surface  of  the  soil,  we  come  to  the 
aboriginal  sepulchres,  when  and  by  whom  made  the  world 
may  never  know.  That  they  were  a  civilized  and  refined 
people,  their  domestic  utensils,  pictures,  jewelry,  vases,  and 
their  mode  of  disposing  of  their  dead,  plainly  show  How  sin¬ 
gular,  that  all  we  no’^  know  of  a  lost  race  is  only  what  the 
tomb  discloses ! 

To  reach  the  top  of  the  Arco  Felice,  we  were  obliged  to  walk 
through  the  cultivated  patch  of  ground  of  a  peasant.  He 


ITALIAN  SIGHTS  AND  PAPAL  PRINCIPLES. 


147 


came  bawling  after  us  for  toll.  Angelo  threw  him  copper, 
but  this  was  not  enough.  He  did  not  cease  his  noise  until 
silver  crossed  his  hand.  His  cabbages  were  planted  on  the 
very  walls  of  Cumae.  From  their  summit  we  enjoyed  a  view 
of  the  distant  Liternum,  the  retreat  and  death-place  of  Scipio 
Africanus,  the  Circean  Promontory  so  nearly  fatal  to  Ulysses, 
the  Acheron,  and  the  islands  of  Ponza,  Ischia,  and  Yandolena. 

Descending  from  the  walls,  which  time  has  almost  wholly 
hidden  in  a  hill,  we  rattled  over  the  Via  Domitiana,  still,  in 
parts,  as  good  as  new,  toward  the  Lake  of  Fusaro,  where  the 
King  of  Naples  has  a  sort  of  oyster-lodge.  On  the  way  wc 
passed  by  and  along  the  River  Styx,  the  Elysian  Fields,  and  oth* 
er  localities  immortalized  in  the  verse  of  Yirgil.  The  Elysian 
Fields  reminded  me  of  one  of  our  prairie  swamps — a  fitter 
abode  for  snakes  and  musquitoes  than  for  beatified  shades. 
The  Styx  was  black  enough  not  to  belie  its  fame.  The  la¬ 
dies — excepting,  of  course,  the  patroness — voted  Yirgil  an  im¬ 
postor,  and  the  dandy  declared  the  King  of  Naples’s  oysters  to 
be  worth  a  dozen  ^Eneids.  So  to  Fusaro  we  drove,  and  bribed 
the  honest  guardian  into  selling  us  a  basket-load  of  the  very 
best,  not  excepting  those  retained  for  the  private  tooth  of  his 
majesty.  Some  we  dispatched  from  the  shell  on  the  spot. 
If  royal  Ferdinand  had  ever  been  on  Chesapeake  Bay,  he 
would  set  small  store  by  his  oyster-bed.  I  came  to  the  con¬ 
clusion  that  either  the  Roman  poets  were  indifierent  judges 
of  oysters,  or  else  they  had  greatly  degenerated  from  the  fat¬ 
ness  and  flavor  of  their  illustrious  ancestors. 

Arriving  at  Baise,  Angelo  deposited  us  and  the  remainder 
of  our  oysters  at  the  door  of  a  hut,  elevated  on  a  stone  plat¬ 
form,  over  the  steps  of  which,  in  large  capital  letters,  was 
written,  Grand  Royal  Queen  Victoria's  Hotel V  This  name 
promised  something,  so  we  entered.  We  were  classically  lo¬ 
cated,  at  all  events.  On  either  side  of  us  were  the  ruins  of 


148 


ITALIAN  SIGHTS  AND  PAPAL  PRINCIPLES. 


the  temples  of  Venus  Genetrix,  and  of  Mercury  and  Diana, 
built  with  brick,  and  probably  once  cased  with  marble.  Sev¬ 
eral  chambers  were  quite  perfect,  and  contained  finely-exe¬ 
cuted  stucco  ornaments.  But  their  entrances  and  interiors 
were  choked  with  earth  and  brambles.  These  ruins  were  the 
only  intelligible  remains  of  the  once  luxurious  Baiss,  which 
for  a  thousand  years  retained  a  sort  of  prescriptive  right  to 
corrupt  the  easy  virtue  of  the  several  races  that  succeeded 
each  other  in  the  lordship  of  this  seductive  soil.  Baias  was 
notorious,  even  amid  the  most  licentious  cities  of  Italy  during 
the  Roman  and  Middle  Ages,  for  its  profligacy.  At  present, 
it  presents  nothing  more  seductive  than  beggars,  colliers,  and 
fishing-boats.  It  could  not  even  provide  a  dinner.  We  call¬ 
ed  for  meat :  there  was  none.  We  ran  over  an  entire  “  carte” 
of  supposed  eatables.  The  result  was,  that  our  host  of  the 
“  Grand  Royal  Gueen  Victoria’s  Hotel”  agreed  to  provide  us  a 
table  to  eat  our  oysters  from,  a  loaf  of  bread,  a  dish  of  macca- 
roni,  and  a  bottle  of  wine.  This  was  not  over-satisfactory  to 
the  appetites  of  a  party  who  had  been  already  six  hours  hard 
at  work,  and  had  as  many  more  in  prospect.  There  was 
nothing  else,  so  we  fell  to.  The  maccaroni  was  too  hard 
and  black  for  heretical  throats,  so  we  had  the  satisfaction  of 
seeing  Angelo  swallow  that  instead  of  ourselves.  The  wine 
I  mistook  for  vinegar,  but  “  mine  host”  indignantly  asserted 
that  it  was  “  genuine  Falernian,”  and  quite  as  good  as  any 
Horace  ever  tippled  with.  We  all  owed  it  a  debt  of  grati¬ 
tude  ;  for,  had  it  not  been  as  potent  as  it  proved,  I  believe  the 
slimy  oysters  would  have  given  us  the  cholera.  While  we 
were  dining,  several  carriage-loads  of  visitors  drove  up.  Some 
provident  souls  had  brought  their  dinners  from  Naples ;  oth¬ 
ers  came  as  we,  with  the  spoils  of  the  Fusaran  Lake,  and 
dined  on  them.  Beggars  clamored  for  alms  and  the  remains 
of  our  meals.  They  said  that  they  were  hungry.  We  sym- 


ITALIAN  SIGHTS  AND  PAPAL  PRINCIPLES. 


149 


pathized,  and  wondered  on  what  the  poor  of  Baise  could  pos¬ 
sibly  exist,  when  its  “  Grand  Hotel”  could  furnish  hut  bad 
maccaroni  and  stale  bread.  One  old  woman,  a  regular  Hec¬ 
ate  in  looks,  brought  grass,  and  devoured  it  by  handsful,  to 
show  the  quality  of  her  appetite.  The  fare  of  this  female 
Nebuchadnezzar  was  only  one  stage  worse  than  ours,  so  all 
we  could  do  was  to  give  her  money,  by  way  of  encourage- 
fnent  to  repeat  her  trick  for  the  benefit  of  Angelo’s  next  vic¬ 
tims.  A  little  hoy  and  girl  danced  the  tarantella  after  a 
inanner  that  won  for  them  many  coppers,  and  cries  for  more. 

From  Baise  to  Bauli  is  a  short  and  romantic  drive,  and  a 
series  of  views  such  as  the  combined  natural  and  artificial 
beauty  of  the  Bay  of  Naples  can  alone  present.  In  contrast 
with  the  other  towns  in  this  neighborhood,  which  grow  out  of 
and  upon  the  ruins  of  temples,  palaces,  and  imperial  villas, 
like  fungi  and  other  vegetable  excrescences  from  the  decayed 
trunks  of  once  noble  trees,  Bauli  was  cleanly  and  industrious. 
Every  man,  woman,  and  child — even  the  infant  at  the  breast 
— begged  ;  but  they  begged  good-naturedly,  and  as  a  matter 
of  course,  without  interrupting  their  work,  grateful  if  they  got 
any  thing,  and  joking  each  other  if  disappointed.  Mothers 
pointed  to  their  children,  and  asked  for  a  penny  because  they 
were  so  pretty.  The  trafiic  in  distorted  limbs  and  disgusting 
diseases  had  not  taken  root  here.  The  population  was  too 
good-looking  to  be  willing  to  sacrifice  their  beauty  for  the 
doubtful  gains  of  spurious  charity. 

From  the  hill  we  looked  down  upon  the  foundations  of  the 
villa  of  Hortensius,  in  the  water,  near  which  Nero  caused  his 
mother,  Agrippina,  to  be  killed.  The  graphic  description  of 
this  event  by  Tacitus  came  up  vividly  before  me  as  I  gazed 
upon  the  site  of  his  demoniacal  crime.  For  miles  we  wan¬ 
dered  over  the  hills,  every  where  meeting  some  interesting 
remains  of  antiquity,  until  they  became  tiresome  from  their 


150 


ITALIAN  SIGHTS  AND  PAPAL  PRINCIPLES. 


very  numbers.  There  were  the  villa  of  Lucullus,  where  Ti¬ 
berius  died — the  subterranean  chambers,  dark,  narrow,  and 
more  than  gloomy  ;  ghastly,  like  the  Roman  catacombs,  chris¬ 
tened  “the  prisons  of  Nero;”  they  are  foul  and  terrible 
enough  for  the  tender  mercies  of  any  tyrant,  ancient  or  mod¬ 
ern,  though  Nero  may  be  guiltless  of  any  thing  in  regard  to 
them  except  having  given  them  a  name ;  and  the  most  won¬ 
derful  object  of  all,  the  immense  artificial  reservoir,  which 
contained  the  purified  water  for  the  use  of  the  Roman  fleet  at 
Misenum.  This  reservoir  is  excavated  in  the  hill,  the  top 
being  arched,  and  sustained  by  vast  brick  pillars.  The  whole 
interior  is  covered  with  cement,  which  is  coated  with  incrusta¬ 
tions  of  lime.  It  is  ventilated  from  above,  and  stone  steps 
lead  down  to  the  floor,  now  free  from  water,  except  what  is 
deposited  by  rain.  Cape  Misenum  commands  an  extensive 
coup  d'ocil  of  the  Bay  of  Naples,  the  old  port  and  naval  station 
— now  a  sort  of  lake — and  the  classical  shore  and  sites  which 
we  had  traversed. 

We  had  still  much  work  before  us,  according  to  the  plan  of 
the  lady  patroness,  who  was  resolutely  bent  upon  condensing 
into  one  day  enough  for  the  labors  of  six.  Accordingly,  al¬ 
lowing  only  a  few  minutes  to  one  of  the  finest  prospects  in 
Europe,  she  turned  our  heads  toward  Pozzuoli,  giving  us  a  dif¬ 
ferent  view  of  many  of  the  objects  already  examined,  besides 
a  closer  one  of  the  artificial  fish-ponds,  so  dear  to  Roman  gour¬ 
mands.  Pliny  would  have  us  believe  that  the  fishes  in  these 
ponds  knew  the  voices  of  their  keepers,  and  came  at  their 
call ;  that  each  responded  to  its  name  by  leaping  out  of  the 
water,  and  that  the  pets  wore  necklaces  and  ear-rings  ;  his 
statement  must  have  been  the  father  of  “  fish-stories.” 

At  Nero’s  villa,  of  which  some  brick-work  alone  remains, 
we  entered  his  vapor-baths,  which  are  underneath  jts  site. 
The  entrance  is  like  that  of  an  ordinary  cave,  but  the  heat 


ITALIAN  SIGHTS  AND  PAPAL  PRINCIPLES. 


151 


soon  becomes  oppressive  and  stifling.  Before  we  were  aware 
of  his  object,  a  guide,  stripped  naked  to  the  waist,  seized  a 
bucket  and  some  eggs,  and  requested  the  ladies  to  follow  him. 
They  did  for  a  rod  or  so,  into  a  circuitous  and  narrow  hole 
leading  down  into  the  bowels  of  the  hill,  and  then  rushed 
back,  faint,  and  streaming  with  perspiration.  Angelo  said  it 
would  be  imprudent  for  them  to  venture  farther  without  they 
stripped  also,  a  process  to  which  they  were  not  at  all  inclined, 
even  to  gratify  their  curiosity  by  discovering  what  there  was 
so  hot  below.  In  two  minutes  the  guide  returned,  reeking 
with  steam  like  a  leaky  boiler.  He  had  been  far  enough  to 
dip  up  the  boiling  water,  and  brought  us  back  the  eggs  cook¬ 
ed  to  a  charm.  We  were  already  half  boiled  "ourselves,  and 
gladly  hastened  to  the  outer  air  to  cool.  Angelo  had  a  warm 
battle  with  this  salamander,  who  wanted  twenty-five  cents 
apiece  for  his  eggs  ;  but  the  threat  of  bringing  no  more  stran¬ 
gers  to  his  lair  brought  down  his  demands  one  half. 

The  Sibyl’s  Cave,  or,  as  it  is  more  poetically  called,  the  grot¬ 
to  of  the  Cumsean  Sibyl,  was  too  tempting  a  titbit  for  the  la¬ 
dies  to  forego.  Dandy  and  myself  were  content  with  our 
present  experience  of  classical  grottoes,  but  we  were  out-voted, 
and  forced  by  our  gallantry  to  accompany  the  ladies  to  this, 
if  we  may  credit  Yirgil,  avenue  to  the  infernal  regions.  It 
was  none  too  good  to  be  such,  judging  from  first  impressions, 
as  its  gloomy  door  opened,  and  we  followed  a  tribe  of  half-na¬ 
ked,  muscular  guides  into  a  descending  passage  cut  deep  into 
the  hill.  Its  darkness  was  scarcely  relieved  by  the  flaring 
light  of  torches.  How  deep  and  far  we  trudged  after  our  of¬ 
ficious  guides,  who  encouraged  us  at  each  step  to  proceed,  I 
can  not  say.  All  at  once  they  stopped  and  pointed  to  a  nar¬ 
row  passage,  descending  rapidly  into  the  mountain,  and  scarce¬ 
ly  wide  enough  for  a  man  to  pass  through.  This,  they  said, 
was  the  entrance  to  the  Sibyl’s  chambers.  As  she  was  out, 


152 


ITALIAN  SIGHTS  AND  PAPAL  PRINCIPLES. 


there  could  be  no  impropriety  in  entering,  though  there  would 
have  been  a  touch  of  it  in  the  way  the  ladies  penetrated  into 
her  sanctuary,  had  we  been  exposed  to  daylight.  This  pas¬ 
sage,  the  depths  of  which  the  eye  vainly  sought  to  penetrate, 
was  two  feet  deep  in  water.  The  only  mode  of  ingress  was 
by  mounting  the  backs  of  our  guides,  “  good  horses”  as  they 
called  themselves.  A  man  with  a  torch  preceded  each.  The 
ladies  put  their  knees  into  the  hands  of  their  “  horses,”  which 
were  turned  behind  them,  threw  their  arms  with  choking 
tightness  around  their  necks,  bowed  their  fair  faces,  destined 
soon  to  lose  their  fairness,  close  to  their  curly  manes,  and 
cried  out,  “  Go  ahead.”  As  we  were  all  alike  mounted,  all 
were  on  an  equality  of  appearance,  though  I  “  guessed,”  as 
well  as  the  darkness  would  permit,  that  the  ladies,  in  their 
anxiety  to  preserve  appearances,  cut  the  worse  figure.  Splash, 
splash  went  the  water ;  of  course,  the  ladies  screamed,  and 
wondered  where  the  next  step  would  take  them.  The  water 
became  a  little  deeper,  that  was  all ;  but  the  sides  of  the 
passage  were  coated  with  the  soot  of  the  thousands  of  torches 
that  had  for  centuries  preceded  curious  ladies  into  or  down 
this  chimney  of  Pluto,  for  to  nothing  else  could  I  liken  it. 
The  soot,  of  course,  rubbed  off  into  their  dresses — ^the  torches 
sent  flame  and  smoke  into  our  faces.  We  were  half  choked 
with  foul  air,  but  still  held  on  ;  indeed,  to  turn  was  impossible. 
At  last  a  sort  of  chamber  opened  upon  us.  It  was  about  the  size 
of  a  state  carriage,  half  full  of  water,  and  as  black,  as  Erebus. 
The  panting  guides  deposited  us,  nearly  up  to  our  ankles  in 
water,  on  a  narrow  stone  platform,  which  they  called  the  Sib¬ 
yl’s  bed.  A  little  farther  on  there  was  another  chamber,  the 
counterpart  of  this.  We  knew  there  was  water  there,  because 
we  felt  and  heard  it ;  there  were  walls,  because  we  rested 
against  them  ;  but,  except  as  the  torches  flashed  out  their  du¬ 
bious  light,  we  could  no  more  see  than  if  we  had  been  p?it 


I 


ITALIAN  SIGHTS  AND  PAPAL  PRINCIPLES. 


153 


away  mummied  on  a  shelf  in  the  centre  of  the  grand  pyramid. 
We  had  come  thus  far  through  smoke,  soot,  and  water,  to  find 
ourselves  buried  in  a  small-sized  tomb,  deep  into  the  earth, 
with  an  equal  chance  of  being  suffocated  or  drowned.  The 
lights  might  go  out,  or  the  guides  might  clear  out.  Either 
thought — and  such  thoughts  will  come,  under  such  circum¬ 
stances — was  unpleasant.  I  suggested  the  policy  of  a  speedy 
retreat,  as  there  was  not  sufficient  inducement  for  additional 
exploration.  Into  such  an  “  infernal”  (I  speak  classically)  hole 
had  the  devouring  curiosity  of  women  plunged  us  ;  and,  worse 
than  all,  I  afterward  learned,  on  good  authority,  that  no  Sibyl 
ever  dwelt  there — a  statement  easily  to  be  believed  after  a 
personal  inspection  of  the  apartment.  In  fact,  the  whole 
story  is  an  “  invention  of  the  enemy”  for  the  benefit  of  the 
biped  horses.  Daylight  revealed  to  each  other  faces  blacker 
than  Othello’s.  I  bathed  mine  in  the  much  scandalized  wa¬ 
ters  of  Lake  Avernus,  and  brought  to  light  a  portion  of  its 
original  color.  The  ladies  polished  away  with  their  handker¬ 
chiefs,  and  dropped  their  veils  to  soften  the  effect.  We  had  a 
long  walk  to  meet  the  carriage,  which  rapidly  bore  us  to  a 
new  field  of  antiquities. 

As  we  drove  into  Pozzuoli,  a  squad  of  donkeys  awaited  our 
arrival.  We  had  in  the  course  of  the  day  tried  almost  every 
other  mode  of  locomotion,  and  now  Angelo  said  we  must 
alight  and  mount  these  self-willed  brutes.  I  refused,  insisting 
that  my  two  legs  were  quite  as  capable  of  carrying  me  as  the 
donkey’s  four.  But  it  was  of  no  use.  The  others  were 
mounted,  and  the  urchin  driver  of  the  ass  allotted  as  mine 
drove  him  after  me,  now  causing  him  suddenly  to  stop  before 
me,  brushing  by  at  my  side,  every  once  in  a  while  making 
an  offensive  demonstration  with  his  heels,  until,  to  escape 
them,  I  was  forced  to  stride  his  back.  Thick  and  fast  came 
the  blows  upon  the  poor  creature’s  flanks  as  we  hurried 

G  2 


154 


ITALIAN  SIGHTS  AND  PAPAL  PRINCIPLES. 


through  the  narrow  and  uneven  lanes.  Up  hill  and  down, 
over  rocks  and  gulleys,  they  trotted  tumultuously,  now  toss¬ 
ing  us  against  each  other,  then  rubbing  our  legs  against  a  stone 
wall,  or  threatening  to  leave  our  brains  on  some  wayside  tree  ; 
on,  on  we  jolted,  clinging  in  desperation  to  our  saddles,  our 
spines  twisting,  bobbing,  and  dodging  like  saplings  in  a  whirl¬ 
wind  in  our  efforts  to  avoid  overthrowing  and  being  over¬ 
thrown,  while  the  impish  drivers  vigorously  applied  the  lash, 
and  frightened,  by  hideous  yells,  their  Liliputian  animals  into 
still  more  pell-mell  haste.  Even  donkey  nature  has  its  lim¬ 
its  of  forbearance.  Dandy  was  mounted  upon  the  fleetest. 
It  had  gone  ahead  of  all  the  others,  quite  indifferent  as  to 
whether  it  bore  us  from  our  saddles  as  it  scrambled  furiously 
by,  or  left  its  rider’s  limbs  lodged  in  some  rocky  crevice.  This 
was  quite  as  much  as  could  be  expected  from  the  most  ambi¬ 
tious  donkey  ;  but  its  owner,  proud  of  its  spirit,  concentrated 
all  his  energies  of  muscle  and  lung  into  a  combined  blow  and 
shout,  intended  to  develop  all  its  latent  powers  of  wind  and 
speed.  His  success  in  astonishing  us  was  both  complete  and 
satisfactory.  The  donkey  stopped  as  short  as  if  he  had  been 
simultaneously  changed  into  stone.  Dandy,  who  had  been 
enjoying  the  race,  the  only  thing  besides  the  oysters  that  he 
had  enjoyed,  was  pitched  hat-foremost  over  his  head.  In  fall¬ 
ing,  he  threw  his  arms  around  the  animal’s  neck.  This  ma¬ 
noeuvre  saved  his  beaver  and  its  contents,  but  brought  him 
underneath  the  ass,  with  his  face  in  affectionate  proximity  to 
the  brute’s,  as  if  he  were  bent  on  giving  him  a  kiss,  while 
donkey  was  shaking  his  ears  with  anticipated  delight.  The 
ludicrous  attitude  of  the  two  was  irresistible  ;  the  young  la¬ 
dies  merrily  complimented  Dandy  upon  his  conquest,  and 
laughed  until  their  own  equilibriums  were  shaken.  Even 
madam  patroness  said  the  sight  was  worth  one  grotto,  or  even 
a  cracked  column. 


ITALIAN  SIGHTS  AND  PAPAL  PRINCIPLES. 


155 


Without  farther  accident  we  arrived  at  the  semi-extinct 
crater  of  Solfaterra,  which  had  seen  its  best  days  before  Vesu¬ 
vius  was  born.  It  is  about  a  mile  in  circumference,  and  at 
present  serves  as  a  vast  laboratory  of  alum,  vitriol,  and  sal- 
ammoniac,  which  are  here  manufactured  in  large  quantities. 
Scalding  fumes  of  sulphur  still  arise  in  places.  The  floor  of 
the  crater  is  a  vast  dome.  Upon  dropping  a  large  stone,  the 
noise  is  like  that  of  muffled  thunder  or  the  reverberation  of 
the  bottomless  pit.  How  deep  and  extensive  is  the  cavity 
beneath,  none  but  Providence  can  tell,  but  the  sound  gives  one 
a  nervous  apprehension  of  the  thinness  of  this  natural  roof, 
for  it  really  seems  as  if  the  stone  would  break  it  through,  and 
precipitate  the  visitors  into  its  fathomless  fires.  It  would  be 
a  curious  experiment  to  pierce  this  volcanic  arch,  and  peer 
into  the  secrets  of  nature  beneath. 

But  our  greatest  danger  was  from  the  workmen,  who  clam¬ 
ored  for  money  with  more  the  air  of  robbers  than  beggars. 
They  surrounded  our  animals,  insisting  upon  performing  num¬ 
berless  unwelcome  services.  To  give  to  one  was  to  encour¬ 
age  all.  .  Angelo  counseled  closed  fingers  and  frigid  apathy. 
We  got  away  as  speedily  as  possible,  but  not  without  paying 
tribute  to  a  well-dressed  and  polite  individual,  who  represent¬ 
ed  himself  as  door-keeper  to  the  volcano. 

After  visiting  the  ancient  amphitheatre,  the  subterranean 
story  of  which  is  an  anomaly  in  this  species  of  architecture, 
and,  thanks  to  the  earthquakes  that  buried  it,  is  now  well  pre¬ 
served,  we  voted,  as  it  was  dark,  that  we  would  go  to  see  no 
more  ruins  this  day.  This  amphitheatre  was  a  mere  bagatelle 
of  an  edifice.  It  held  only  forty-five  thousand  spectators. 
The  price  of  admission,  I  judged,  was  about  the  same  now  as 
when  the  imperial  butcher  Nero  honored  the  games  with  his 
presence.  The  royal  bounty  of  King  Ferdinand  to  his  loving 
courtiers  is  shown  more  by  the  gift  of  an  ancient  ruin  than  by 


156 


ITALIAN  SIGHTS  AND  PAPAL  PRINCIPLES. 


a  modern  palace.  The  latter  would  bring  most  of  them  to 
ruin,  bi^t  the  former  pays  the  better  in  proportion  that  it  lacks 
repairs.  The  ancients  were  a  liberal  race.  They  not  only 
made  their  own  fortunes,  but  those  of  their  remotest  descend¬ 
ants. 

The  asses  were  to  be  paid,  and  Angelo  also.  The  former 
had  taken  us  to  our  carriage  just  outside  the  town,  where 
awaited  us  a  similar  crowd  to  that  which  we  had  encountered 
in  the  morning.  Angelo,  who  I  mistrusted  was  chief  of  the 
asses  himself,  recommended  a  liberal  sum.  This  given,  the 
drivers  wanted  each  about  as  much  more  for  their  efforts  to 
break  our  necks.  One  had  held  the  bridle  while  the  beautiful 
“  signorina”  had  mounted,  another  had  picked  up  the  fallen 
dandy,  a  third  had  yelled  and  pelted  the  donkeys  with  stones ; 
each  had  some  similar  service  to  urge.  As  no  Italian  is  satis¬ 
fied  with  being  once  paid,  we  gave  each  a  trifle  more,  and 
they  showered  down  upon  our  excellencies  “  many  happy  re¬ 
turns  of  the  day,”  to  which  we  devoutly  responded,  “  God 
forbid  !” 

“  How  much  do  we  owe  you,  Angelo,  Prince  of  Ciceroni  ?” 

“  Oh !  your  excellency,  some  gentlemen  give  me  a  dollar, 
and  some  a  dollar  and  a  half.” 

The  smaller  sum  was  just  double  his  legitimate  wages,  and 
he  had,  to  my  certain  knowledge,  made  nearly  as  much  more 
out  of  the  oyster  speculation  alone  ;  but  we  were  all  in  good 
humor  at  the  prospect  of  the  speedy  termination  of  our  labors, 
and  I  handed  him  the  “  dollar  and  a  half.”  Angelo  received 
it  with  a  profusion  of  Neapolitan  thanks,  and  hoped  we  would 
remember  him  the  next  time  we  came  that  way.  The  very 
next  day  I  sent  him  another  greenhorn,  and  I  do  not  doubt 
that  he  remembers  me  in  his  prayers  to  this  hour. 

As  for  the  horde  of  venders  of  antiquities,  and  beggars  of 
all  grades,  we  left  them  our  good  wishes  and  the  hopes  of  our 


ITALIAN  SIGHTS  AND  PAPAL  PRINCIPLES. 


157 


return.  Fifteen  dollars  disbursed  among  the  parasites  of 
sight-seers  in  one  day,  in  the  cheapest  country  in  Europe,  was 
quite  sufficient  relief  to  our  consciences.  Besides,  we  yearned 
for  our  dinner.  The  coachman  drove  rapidly  Naples-ward 
along  the  beach  fronting  the  superb  little  island  of  Nisida, 
where  Brutus  was  wont  to  pass  his  summer  hours.  "We  then 
ascended  the  road  made  by  the  French,  leading  to  the  city, 
and  looking  down  upon  the  most  magnificent  sea  and  shore 
panorama  in  Europe.  Beautiful  is  that  prospect  by  day,  and 
glorious  by  night,  with  Vesuvius  looking  like  a  thing  of  life, 
keeping  treacherous  watch  over  a  coast  it  adorns  but  to  de¬ 
stroy.  Other  bays  are  lovely — as  Santa  Catharina,  Panama, 
and  Rio  de  Janeiro  bear  witness — but  in  this  wide  and  beau¬ 
tiful  world  there  is  but  one  Bay  of  Naples. 

In  thirteen  hours  from  the  time  we  had  left  the  hotel  we 
were  back  again.  That  the  reader  may  really  appreciate 
what  we  “  did  up,”  I  shall  catalogue  our  principal  game  : 
Two  craters,  five  lakes,  four  ruined  cities,  five  grottoes  and 
vapor-baths,  more  or  less  poisonous,  an  amphitheatre,  one  ru¬ 
ined  prison,  two  ditto  reservoirs,  one  ditto  gate,  two  ditto  aque¬ 
ducts  and  bridges,  seven  ditto  villas,  three  fish-ponds,  and  six 
temples,  including  thirty  miles  carriage-ride,  three  ditto  don¬ 
key-back,  distance  man-back  uncertain,  and  some  five  or  six 
miles  of  walking,  climbing,  stumbling,  and  subterranean  ex¬ 
ploring,  besides  a  small  piece  of  boating,  and  the  paying  of 
upward  of  thirty  distinct  fees  and  gratuities. 


CHAPTER  YII. 


A  DAY  AT  POMPEII. 

What  traveler  fails  to  associate  with  Naples  a  laughing 
sky,  a  beauteous  soil,  a  smiling  sea — in  short,  that  happy  com¬ 
bination  of  elements  which,  making  up  our  idea  of  a  terres¬ 
trial  paradise,  ever  beckons  us  to  approach  and  pluck  its  fruits 
of  enjoyment?  The  ancients  sought  to  secure  this  coveted 
happiness  by  the  discovery  of  the  “  Fortunate  Islands.”  Their 
descendants,  still  more  eager  and  worldly,  not  contented  with 
the  prodigality  of  Nature  in  a  climate  more  favored  than  Plato 
ever  imagined,  have  worried  science  and  research  in  the  futile 
effort  to  detect  the  elixir  of  life,  or  discover  the  fountain  of 
youth,  that  they  might  drink  of  the  one  or  bathe  in  the  other, 
and  live  forever  on  the  earth.  But  there  are  certain  secrets 
that  Nature  seems  determined  to  keep,  although  constantly 
flattering  us  that  she  is  upon  the  point  of  disclosing  the  covet¬ 
ed  mysteries.  Among  them  is  the  common  delusion  of  a 
“  good  climate” — an  atmospherical  Eden,  which  is  neither  too 
hot  nor  too  cold,  too  damp  nor  too  dry,  and,  opening  every  pore 
to  sensuous  delight,  w’’e  would  be  content  to  pronounce  it  “just 
right.”  Having  tried  a  greater  variety  of  climates  than  is  the 
usual  lot  of  man,  I  am  satisfied  that  w^hile  all  have  their  good 
points,  there  is  none  perfect.  The  only  sure  rule  of  enjoyment 
is  “  to  make  hay  while  the  sun  shines,”  and  not  to  believe  that 
because  Dame  Nature  smiles  to-day  she  will  to-morrow.  She 
is  a  coquette  from  principle,  and  often  fascinates  but  the  more 
speedily  to  disappoint. 


ITALIAN  SIGHTS  AND  PAPAL  PRINCIPLES. 


159 


She  smiles  so  sweetly,  however,  upon  Naples,  when  she 
does  smile,  that  one  is,  as  it  were,  subdued  into  enjoyment, 
in  spite  of  human  nature  and  its  thousand  ills  and  wayward 
humors.  Her  fine  days  are  absolutely  borrowed  from  Para¬ 
dise.  The  atmosphere  absolutely  becomes  an  elixir  of  health 
'  and  fountain  of  happiness.  The  soul  is  not  beguiled  into  that 
dreamy  languor,  so  fatal  to  exertion  in  the  tropics,  but  it 
nerves  the  body  to  active  pleasure  and  grateful  emotions.  Like 
the  lark,  one  longs  to  soar  and  sing  in  the  sparkling  sunlight, 
receiving  health  and  bliss  in  each  expansion  of  wing.  The 
ripe  fruit,  however,  does  not  drop  into  the  lap,  but  it  must  he 
plucked.  Hence,  in  a  temperature  like  that  of  Naples  arises 
that  superior  happiness  which  results  from  the  equal  stimulus 
and  employment  of  both  mind  and  body  under  circumstances 
the  most  favorable,  so  far  as  God’s  works  are  concerned,  for  the 
perfect  development  of  life — life  in  the  sense  of  blissful  ex¬ 
istence,  where  every  breath  is  pleasure,  and  every  pulsation 

joy- 

Yet  Naples  is  sadly  capricious,  notwithstanding  her  largess 
of  delights.  She  gives,  but  she  exacts  also.  The  scorching 
sirocco  shrinks  the  pores  and  strangles  the  mind.  It  is  a  fiery 
furnace,  in  which  every  previous  atmospherical  sense  of  en¬ 
joyment  is  consumed  by  slow  torture.  The  reaction  in  the 
nervous  system  is  terrible.  Africa,  by  one  blast  of  her  breath, 
revenges  a  thousand  wrongs.  I  know  nothing  in  the  whole 
range  of  winds  more  soul-subduing,  body-famishing,  than  the 
sirocco.  It  wilts,  it  shrinks,  it  parches,  it  enfeebles  ;  it  irri¬ 
tates,  it  pinches,  it  pricks,  it  tickles  ;  it  is  an  amalgam  of 
melancholy  and  imbecility,  the  subtlest  medium  for  low  spir¬ 
its  ever  let  loose  upon  egotistical  man,  and  yields  to  no  exor¬ 
cism  save  that  of  a  shift  of  the  weather-cock. 

The  eccentricities  of  weather  tend,  I  believe,  to  make  Na¬ 
ples  what  it  really  is,  a  city  of  paradoxes.  Its  subtle  influ- 


160 


ITALIAN  SIGHTS  AND  PAPAL  PRINCIPLES. 


ences  affect  the  national  character,  and  give  it  a  composite 
element  of  seeming  eccentricities.  One  is  equally  eager  to  ar¬ 
rive  and  to  leave ;  both  emotions  have  their  pleasurable  asso¬ 
ciations.  Naples,  after  Rome,  is  like  a  resurrection  trom  the 
grave  to  the  world.  Here  we  find  life  in  its  active  sense. 
London  life  is  a  dull,  plodding,  staid,  wearisome  life  ;  forms 
and  shams — much  eating  and  loud  speaking  are  its  elements. 
New  York  life  is  a  commercial  whirlpool ;  “  to  get”  is  written 
on  every  man’s  brow  ;  the  weak  are  swallowed  up,  while  the 
strong  splash,  and  toss,  and  foam  upon  the  broad  current  of 
Mammon.  Paris  life  is  a  refined,  sensuous  emotion,  selfish  but 
courteous — a  graceful  flowing  of  the  stream  of  pleasure  toward 
the  precipice  of  death.  Naples  life  is  deviltry  itself.  It  is  at 
once  the  busiest  and  idlest  city  of  them  all,  overflowing  with 
merriment  while  steeped  in  misery ;  with  the  most  glitter  it 
exhibits  the  most  rags  ;  and  from  beauty  to  ugliness  there  is 
but  one  step,  which  forms  the  bridge  of  contrast ;  and  these  ex¬ 
ternal  contrasts,  joined  to  virtues  and  vices  of  equally  opposite 
degrees,  are  in  general  concentrated  in  every  individual  inhab¬ 
itant.  Electrify  these  extremes  by  the  active  affinities  of  life, 
quickened  into  intensity  by  a  climate  which  gives,  as  it  were, 
an  additional  sense  of  pleasure  or  pain  to  every  passion  or 
emotion,  and  we  have  the  veritable  Neapolitan,  the  real  child 
of  the  Sun — at  once  the  most  indolent  and  most  active,  the 
most  vivacious  and  the  most  taciturn,  the  best  humored  and 
most  revengeful,  the  most  cunning  and  the  most  frank,  the 
greatest  vagabond  and  the  best  fellow — all  things  to  all  men  ; 
quick-witted,  sagacious,  begging,  specious,  hypocritical,  super¬ 
stitious,  lying,  droll,  amiable,  talking  with  double  -tongue  pow¬ 
er,  and  gesticulating  specimen  of  humanity  extant.  To  com¬ 
plete  the  paradox,  because  Nature  has  been  to  them  over- 
bountiful,  they  want  but  little  besides  her  sunshine. 

Naples  is  frightfully  busy  ;  the  stir  in  the  streets  is  most  ex- 


ITALIAN  SIGHTS  AND  PAPAL  PRINCIPLES. 


161 


traordinary.  Even  the  fleas  must  be  endowed  with  extra 
hopping  powers  to  get  a  bite,  so  quick  and  restless  is  this  pop¬ 
ulation,  unless  they  see  fit  to  slumber,  when  they  partake 
themselves  to  the  apathy  of  death.  A  stranger  is  tempted  to 
ask.  What  the  deuce  is  all  this  noise  and  shouting  about  ? 
The  very  dust  seems  endued  with  a  portion  of  this  mercu¬ 
rial  activity.  There  are  no  commerce,  war,  elections,  or  pro¬ 
tracted  meetings — in  fact,  it  seems  as  if  there  were  nothing 
to  do,  and  yet  a  more  vigorous  doing-nothing  no  population 
can  display.  One  would  suppose  that  the  city  was  each  day 
either  upon  the  point  of  being  taken  by  storm,  or  had  laid 
siege  to  itself.  The  clang  of  the  trumpet,  the  rub-a-dub  of  the 
drum,  and  the  tramp  of  uniformed  men,  regiment  after  regi¬ 
ment,  are  heard  at  every  corner,  while  batteries  of  grim  guns 
point  through  the  squares,  and  rake  the  principal  streets. 
Above  them,  below  them,  and  around  them,  the  Neapolitans 
are  girt  with  volcanic  fires,  and  a  cordon  of  gunpowder  and 
steel.  Daily,  in  their  midst,  do  they  see  the  tender  mercies 
of  their  government  displayed  by  troops  of  their  fellow-citi¬ 
zens,  clad  in  galley  costume,  and  heavily  chained  together  in 
couples  by  their  arms  and  legs,  followed  by  hireling  soldiers, 
as  they  are  driven  like  cattle  to  their  repulsive  labors.  These 
are  simply  criminals  in  law — criminals  in  politics  are  with¬ 
drawn  from  even  the  semblance  of  human  sympathy,  and  in 
irons,  starvation,  and  solitude,  banished  to  unwholesome  dun¬ 
geons,  to  expiate,  in  protracted  torture  of  mind  and  body,  the 
crime  of  patriotism.  From  prisons  blackened  with  the  mise¬ 
ry  of  ages  and  battered  by  time,  through  strong  and  thick-set 
iron  bars,  despite  the  terrors  of  a  tyrant-drilled  soldiery,  fam¬ 
ishing,  hardened  wretches  stretch  their  gaunt  arms,  and,  with 
mingled  ribaldry  and  blasphemy,  demand  charity,  or  mock  the 
freedom  of  their  former  associates,  who,  with  strange  fascina¬ 
tion,  sun  themselves  beside  the  walls  of  these  sepulchres  of 


162 


ITALIAN  SIGHTS  AND  PAPAL  PRINCIPLES. 


human  virtue  and  liberty.  Elsewhere  the  apparatus  of  tyran¬ 
ny  is  masked,  but  in  Naples  it  stands  forth  as  prominent  as 
Vesuvius,  bristling  with  horrors  like  an  infernal  machine. 
Yet  the  Neapolitans  laugh  and  sing,  work  or  doze,  as  the  im¬ 
pulse  seizes  them,  as  reckless  of  these  evidences  of  their  deg¬ 
radation  as  if  they  were  intended  solely  for  the  inhabitants  of 
another  sphere,  and  not  for  themselves,  their  wives,  and  their 
little  ones.  Their  climate  is  to  them  meat  and  drink,  raiment 
and  liberty.  At  once  the  results  and  supports  of  a  political 
tyranny  and  religious  despotism  that  recalls  the  darkest  ages, 
they  will  continue  to  bask  contentedly  in  the  mire  of  ignorance 
and  slavery  until  some  new  Massaniello  fires  their  passions,  or 
education  awakens  in  them  the  loftier  hopes  and  desires  of 
humanity. 

To  enjoy  Naples,  one  should  not  think.  Its  mocking  joys 
and  stores  of  fun  come  really  home  only  in  the  perfect  aban¬ 
don  of  its  life.  To  float  on  its  current,  and  not  to  dive,  is  the 

\ 

rule  for  enjoyment.  Yet  the  hour  of  satiety,  even  of  pleas¬ 
ure,  is  not  slow  to  come.  A  perpetual  grin  is  fatiguing,  dust 
is  choking,  arid  noise  is  stunning.  Disgust  is  apt  to  poke  its 
sardonic  face  through  the  mask  of  novelty,  so  that  what  one 
not  to  the  manor  bred  and  born  at  first  found  amusing,  begins 
at  last  to  be  wearisome.  Now,  as  in  the  days  of  the  Phara¬ 
ohs,  the  skeleton  will  appear  unbidden  at  the  feast.  Besides, 
there  are  some  ingredients  in  a  Neapolitan  crowd  rather  un¬ 
profitable  than  otherwise  both  to  purse  and  morals.  Pimps 
importune  with  a  pertinacity  peculiarly  Neapolitan,  reciting  a 
tariff  for  every  feminine  charm  and  masculine  vice  ;  beggars 
whine,  extort,  and  turn  the  public  walks  into  pathological  mu¬ 
seums  for  the  exhibition  of  sores  and  deformity.  But  the  most 
amusing  and  successful  of  the  street  leeches  are  the  pickpock¬ 
ets.  A  thief  in  Naples  is  a  hero.  The  public  make  way  for 
him  to  escape,  and  close  up  against,  his  pursuer.  I  had  my 


LAZZAKONI  at  NATTEi. 


164 


ITALIAN  SIGHTS  AND  PAPAL  PRINCIPLES. 


pocket  picked  almost  as  soon  as  I  entered  the  street — an  event 
which,  in  fifteen  years’  travel,  had  happened  but  once  before. 
A  friend  of  mine  rarely  was  able  to  keep  a  handkerchief 
through  a  promenade.  In  self-defense,  he  took  to  the  cheapest 
cotton.  As  he  was  stepping  into  his  carriage,  he  missed,  as 
usual,  the  article.  At  the  same  moment,  he  saw  it  thrown 
contemptuously  toward  him  by  one  of  the  street  gentry,  who, 
amid  the  jeers  of  the  crowd,  vented  his  disappointment  by 
crying  out,  “  Who  would  have  thought  a  gentleman  like  him 
would  have  carried  a  pocket-handkerchief  like  that 

Then,  too,  one  tires  of  seeing,  surfeited  urchins  swallow  mac- 
caroni  by  the  unbroken  fathom  at  the  rate  of  a  copper  a  dish, 
for  the  amusement  of  the  forestieri"  who  marvel  at  such 
gastronomic  dexterity.  Turning  their  heads,  they  can  see  laz- 
zaroni  family  groups  amicably  engaged  in  furnishing  each 
member  with  food  from  their  superfluous  craniological  stock — 
a  process  unfortunately  common,  and  by  no  means  a  whet  to 
a  fastidious  appetite.  But  the  cruelest  sight  of  all  is  the 
amount  of  work  exacted  from  one  little  horse.  An  Italian 
nowhere  is  by  any  means  sensitive  in  his  treatment  of  these 
animals.  The  whip  is  made  to  supply  the  deficiency  of  spirit 
even  among  gentlemen’s  studs.  But  Naples  is  the  true  purga¬ 
tory  of  horseflesh.  The  horses  here  must  possess  some  vital 
tenacity  unknown  elsewhere.  The  Neapolitans,  too,  contrive 
to  infuse  some  of  their  own  devil-may-care  hilarity  even  into 
their  beasts,  dressing  them  up  with  flowers,  feathers,  bells, 
and  gay  trappings,  so  that  what  with  the  shouting,  laughter, 
jokes,  and  flogging  of  the  party  he  draws,  the  poor  brute 
seems  really  to  be  enjoying  his  holiday  instead  of  doing  the 
labor  of  four  horses.  A  Neapolitan  cabriolet  is  a  “  sight”  of  it¬ 
self.  Look,  dear  reader  !  This  is  no  rare  show.  A  medley  of 
priest  and  woman,  thief  and  peasant,  beggar  and  bride,  charac¬ 
teristic  Neapolitans  every  soul  of  them,  with  a  baby  screaming 


eapolitax  cabriolet. 


/ 


166  ITAT.TAN  SIGHTS  AND  PAPAL  PRINCIPLES.  , 


for  joy  in  the  basket  under  the  axle,  twenty-one  in  all,  overhead 
and  ears  in  frolic,  with  but  one  half-starved  horse  to  shake  them 
to  their  journey’s  end.  They  manage,  too,  to  get  a  speed  out 
of  these  quadruped  victims  that  is  really  astonishing  to  pedes¬ 
trians,  and  often  puts  them  in  no  little  danger  of  their  limbs. 
I  can  compare  one  of  these  parties  in  full  chorus  only  to  a  jo¬ 
vial  war-whoop — one’s  hair  stands  on  end  as  they  dash  by, 
and  one  laughs  as  if  it  were, his  last  chance. 

On  an  unimpeachable  morning  toward  the  end  of  April, 
when  the  weather  was  literally  faultless,  the  air  the  breath 
of  heaven  itself,  not  a  cloud  to  dim  the  lustre  of  a  sky  whose 
lucidity  seemed  to  realize  infinity,  while  the  “  Bay”  slept  tran¬ 
quil  under  the  balmiest  of  zephyrs,  and  the  distant  islands  and 
headlands  lay  robed  in  translucency  as  if  defying  criticism — 
on  such  a  day  I  awoke  in  Naples,  satisfied,  nay,  disgusted  with 
its  chaos  of  sights  and  sounds,  and 'cast  about  me  for  some 
quiet  retreat  where  I  might,  if  but  for  a  few  short  hours,  be¬ 
come  oblivious  to  its  soulless  turmoil. 

“  Eureka!”  The  dead  city  flashed  on  my  mind.  I  have  it! 
To  Pompeii,  then,  I  would  go,  and  commune  with  the  past ; 
not  gregariously,  with  simpering  misses,  yawning  dandies,  or 
impatient  women,  with  heads  too  full  of  the  living  to  give 
place,  even  for  a  brief  moment,  to  thoughts  of  the  dead,  but 
alone,  without  companion  or  guide,  and  there,  in  the  reaction 
of  thought  and  silence,  refresh  my  mind  from  the  vacuous 
tension  of  the  capital  of  fooldom. 

No  sooner  thought  than  executed.  A  few  minutes  found 
me,  with  rail-road  speed — no  great  matter  in  this  kingdom, 
where  iron  is  spared  and  flesh  only  is  driven — rumbling  along 
the  shores  of  the  bay,  now  almost  plowing  up  its  quiet  surges, 
then  bounding  high  over  roofs  and  houses,  the  present  genera¬ 
tions  strangely  mingling  and  overtopping  the  past,  Resina 
upon  Herculaneum,  a  gulf  of  two  thousand  years  dividing  the 


ITALIAN  SIGHTS  AND  PAPAL  PRINCIPLES. 


167 


interval  between  them,  while  Grecian  sepulchres,  Roman 
tombs,  mediseval  lava  streams,  modern  vineyards,  deserted 
houses,  broken  walls,  and  towns,  like  ant-hills,  bursting  with 
life,  were  mingled  at  my  side  in  strange  confusion.  No  other 
rail-road  possesses  an  interest  like  this.  Sepulchral  cities  lie 
beneath  and  along  its  track.  The  waters  of  Naples  splash  its 
seaward  embankments.  On  the  other  side  lives  a  population 
as  dense  as  that  of  China,  and  more  picturesque  in  garb  and 
manners  than  that  of  India.  They  dwell  in  habitations  built 
upon  the  graves  of  their  ancestors,  the  very  earth  they  culti¬ 
vate  being  the  ashes  of  their  forefathers,  whom  war  and  vol¬ 
cano  have  alternately  stricken  down  and  buried  in  one  wide 
devastation,  but  to  be  quickened  again  into  being  by  a  vigor¬ 
ous  nature  that  knows  no  exhaustion.  Life  and  Death  here 
meet  in  ceaseless  strife.  Each  boasts  its  trophies,  and  each 
in  turn  triumphs.  If  the  former  exultingly  displays  Portici, 
Castellamare,  Torre  del  Greco,  and  the  many  towns  and  vil¬ 
lages  that  so  lovingly  nestle  amid  the  vineyards  of  sunny  Ve¬ 
suvius,  all  teeming  with  joyous  existence,  forgetting  that  they 
are  undermined  by  eternal  fires,  the  latter  sternly  reminds  you 
that  beneath  them,  imprisoned  in  her  fatal  embraces,  lie  Her¬ 
culaneum,  Stabise,  and  Pompeii,  once  the  homes  of  a  population 
more  numerous,  more  happy,  and  more  prosperous  than  those 
which  have  succeeded  to  their  dubious  heritaQ-e,  while  above 
them  all  the  treacherous  volcano  lifts  its  head,  ready  at  Na¬ 
ture’s  signal  to  do  again  the  bidding  of  Death.  It  seemed  to 
me  a  moral  defiance  of  Fate,  an  insult  to  the  avenging  Neme¬ 
sis,  thus  to  rudely  bind  together  her  domains  with  bars  of  iron, 
and  to  let  loose  the  shrieking  fire-horse  to  scatter  about  the 
cinders  of  dead  cities  in  the  very  shadow  of  the  fierce  old 
crater  itself.  While  I  was  speculating  whether  Vesuvius  was 
a  stock  “  bull”  or  “  bear,”  and  what  influence  it  might  possess 
at  the  brokers’  board,  the  locomotive’s  whistle  announced  our 


168 


ITALIAN  SIGHTS  AND  PAPAT.  PRINCIPLES. 


arrival  at  the  pretty  little  station-house  of  Pompeii.  This  is 
hut  a  short  distance  from  the  disinterred  town,  of  which  noth¬ 
ing  can  he  seen  while  without,  owing  to  the  vast  mounds  of 
ashes  piled  outside,  forming  a  dike  sufficiently  high  and  strong 
to  turn  aside  any  ordinary  lava-current. 

The  first  object  that  attracted  my  attention  was  the  “  Dio- 
medes  Hotel,”  a  snug  little  restaurant  at  the  outer  base  of  the 
dike  of  cinders.  Shade  of  Lucullus,  to  what  a  base  use  had 
the  old  patrician  gourmand’s  name  descended !  It  had  the 
merit,  however,  of  being  appropriate,  if  one  can  judge  of  the 
character  of  the  owner  by  the  traces  of  good  living  he  left  be¬ 
hind  him.  Diomedes’s  name  has  now  become  as  widely  known 
as  Cato’s.  Death  in  the  fiery  shower  was  to  him  fame.  Had 
he  been  gathered  to  his  fathers  in  the  ordinary  way,  we  should 
never  have  heard  of  him ;  but  now  his  wine-cellar,  his  kitch¬ 
en,  his  bathing-rooms,  garden,  and  all  the  appurtenances  of  a 
fine  old  Roman  gentleman’s  mansion  are  better  known  and 
as  much  visited  as  the  palace  of  all  the  Csesars.  As  his  name 
has  occurred  first,  I  will  briefly  say  what  I  saw  worth  men¬ 
tioning  about  his  premises,  which  are  at  the  other  end  of  the 
city,  just  outside  the  Herculaneum  Gate,  and  then  return  and 
enter  the  town  in  accordance  with  my  actual  route. 

Diomedes’s  villa  was  three  stories  high.  The  upper  one 
is  chiefly  demolished,  but  the  lower  two  are  quite  perfect. 
You  enter  from  the  Via  Domitiana  by  a  doorway  under  a  ru¬ 
ined  portico  with  a  very  modern  look,  and  find  yourself  bewil¬ 
dered  amid  a  series  of  small  but  prettily-situated  rooms,  dis¬ 
playing  even  now  the  traces  of  that  hospitable  luxury  which 
once  distinguished  its  proprietor.  The  dining-room,  or,  as 
some  think  it,  the  best  bed-chamber,  looks  out  upon  the  gar¬ 
den  and  over  the  sea,  which  then  came  almost  to  the  garden 
wall,  although  now  nearly  two  miles  distant.  It  had  a  bow 
front,  or  rather  back,  and  fine  large  windows.  Some  of  the 


CIOMEDES’S  VILLA. 


1 

I 

I 

I 

1 


I 


170 


ITALIAN  SIGHTS  AND  PAPAL  PRINCIPLES. 


■windows  of  this  house  were  glazed  with  a  coarse,  semi-opaque 
glass,  not  uncommon  in  Pompeii,  and  still  manufactured 
abundantly  in  Italy.  The  cook,  or  rather  his  skeleton,  was 
found  at  his  place  in  the  kitchen,  near  the  stove,  on  which  still 
remained  a  bronze  “  casserole,”  or  covered  skillet,  and  other 
traces  of  a  coming  meal,  lie  evidently  thought  the  eruption 
would  not  prove  to  be  much  of  a  shower,  or  else  Homan  cooks, 
like  Roman  sentinels,  were  required  to  die  at  their  posts. 

The  area  of  the  garden  remains  very  much  as  it  w'as  left, 
with  its  porticoes  still  standing,  the  ruins  of  a  fountain,  fish 
reservoir,  and  the  usual  contrivance  of  columns  to  sustain 
vines,  with  seats,  table,  kc.,  answering  to  our  summer-house. 
Just  outside  the  seaward  gate  were  found  two  skeletons,  with 
keys,  coins,  and  other  articles  of  value.  Conjecture,  which  of 
course  has  endless  room  for  play  amid  the  unclaimed  property 
and  nameless  skeletons  of  this  buried-alive  city,  ascribes  to 
one  of  these  human  relics  the  name  of  Diomedes,  who  perished 
while  selfishly  deserting  his  family.  In  this,  however,  we 
may  do  him  injustice,  though  circumstantial  evidence  is 
strongly  against  him.  But  the  wine-cellar,  still  perfect,  and 
lighted  by  the  same  narrow  loop-holes,  looking  into  the  gar¬ 
den,  which  let  in  the  fatal  shower  and  gases,  is  the  most  in¬ 
teresting  spot,  from  the  fact  that  here  were  found  the  remains 
of  twenty  persons,  including  a  child  and  baby,  who  had  here 
taken  refuge,  with  sufficient  provision,  as  they  supposed,  to 
weather  the  strange  storm.  They  were,  however,  speedily 
suffocated  by  the  mephitic  vapors  while  making  a  vain  effort 
to  escape  from  their  fatal  refuge,  the  falling  stones  and  lava 
having  closed  the  door  upon  them  for  eternity.  The  fine  ashes 
and  hot  water,  penetrating  by  the  windows,  formed  a  paste 
around  their  bodies,  preserving  the  impressions  of  form,  and 
even  clothing,  as  perfectly  as  a  sculptor’s  mould.  Even  the 
texture  of  the  fine  linen  worn  by  the  women  was  imprinted 


ITALIAN  SIGHTS  AND  PAPAL  PRINCIPLES. 


171 


on  this  lava  paste,  as  well  as  their  jewels.  The  saddest  relic 
of  all  was  a  portion  of  the  blonde  hair  of  the  mother,  still  re¬ 
taining  its  color  and  shape.  In  the  Museo  Borbonico  at  Na¬ 
ples,  where  all  removable  articles  of  value  are  carried  as  soon 
as  discovered,  we  see  the  impression  in  lava  of  a  female  breast, 
matronly  full  and  fair,  and  an  entire  female  head,  formed  of 
a  fine  crust,  so  delicate  that  it  seems  as  if  a  breath  might  dis¬ 
turb  it,  yet  every  feature  is  as  perfect  as  in  life,  exhibiting  a 
portrait  of  rare  beauty  and  regularity.  No  sculptor  could  have 
taken  his  mould  with  more  precision.  The  utmost  care  is 
taken  of  it,  so  that  it  will  probably  endure  through  all  time  as 
the  sole  artificial  bust  of  Nature’s  moulding,  a  priceless  and 
unique  specimen  of  geological  portraiture.  Whether  these  re¬ 
mains  were  found  or  not  in  Diomedes’s  cellar,  I  do  not  know. 

The  wine-jars  of  Liornedes  remain  leaning  in  rows  against 
the  walls,  as  when  he  last  took  account  of  stock.  They  are 
filled  with  ashes.  Beneath  there  is  a  dried  substance,  which 
connoisseurs  pretend  to  say  still  retains  a  portion  of  the  rich 
aroma  of  the  wines  that  for  thousands  of  years  have  given  to 
Vesuvius  its  most  cherished  celebrity. 

Diomedes,  pagan  though  he  was,  must  have  had  a  more 
cheerful  idea  of  death  than  most  Christians.  He  built  his 
sepulchre,  still  inscribed  with  his  name,  right  over  against  his 
chamber  windows,  and  scarcely  two  rods  off,  so  that  he  never 
could  cross  his  own  threshold  without  having  his  grave  to 
stare  him  in  the  face. 

Near  the  villa  of  Diomedes  there  was  another,  supposed  to 
have  belonged  to  Cicero,  and  mentioned  in  his  letters  to  Atti- 
.cus.  In  it  were  found  some  fine  paintings.  On  one  of  the 
lower  stories  was  the  following  inscription :  “  Sea  and  fresh 
water  baths  of  Marcus  Crassus  Frugius.”  Mr.  Frugius  would 
have  to  go  a  long  way  for  his  salt  water  now ! 

I  entered  Pompeii  from  the  Salerno  road,  opposite  the  rail- 


172 


ITALIAN  SIGHTS  AND  PAPAL  PRINCIPLES. 


road  station.  The  usual  array  of  guides  and  ciceroni  lay  in 
waiting  to  intercept  visitors.  They  are  a  nuisance  under  al¬ 
most  any  circumstances,  and,  being  already  as  familiar'with 
the  localities  of  Pompeii  as  of  New  York,  I  determined,  despite 
the  rule  which  affixes  one,  like  a  shadow,  to  every  visitor  or 
party,  from  fear  of  the  effects  of  antiquarian  covetousness,  to 
wander  unattended  and  unharangued  w’here  I  pleased — “  up 
stairs,  down  stairs,  and  in  the  ladies’  chamber,”  after  the  fash¬ 
ion  of  “  Le  Diable  boiteux,”  on  a  voyage  of  discovery  into  the 
morals  and  customs  of  the  deceased  Pompeians.  To  effect 
this  solitude  required  no  little  skill.  I  hung  back  until  the 
parties  preceding  me  were  supplied,  and  then  loitered  on, 
straggler  fashion,  as  if  belonging  to  one  in  advance.  The  few 
remaining  ciceroni  eyed  me  suspiciously  ;  some,  spider-like, 
dashed  toward  me,  but  I  dodged  them,  or  bluntly  told  them  to 
be  off.  A  few  rods  having  brought  me  to  an  unfrequented 
part  of  the  town,  in  the  rear  of  the  Basilica,  I  slipped  aside, 
and,  privateer-like,  gained  a  good  offing,  with  a  clear  antiqua¬ 
rian  horizon. 

There  was  a  luxury  of  sentiment  in  being  alone  in  Pompeii 
— of  having,  as  it  were,  an  entire  city  to  one’s  self  in  the 
broad  day,  that  had  a-peculiar  charm  to  me.  I  dived  into  cel¬ 
lars,  I  ascended  dilapidated  staircases,  I  pried  into  ladies’  bou¬ 
doirs,  nay,  even  into  their  bed-chambers,  stood  before  family 
altars,  criticised  the  cook’s  department — in  fine,  explored  with 
unblushing  effrontery  the  domestic  secrets  of  every  household, 
rich  or  poor,  plebeian  or  patrician,  which  attracted  me,  with¬ 
out  a  human  voice  to  break  the  spell.  Pompeii  is  not,  as  some 
term  it,  simply  “  a  city  of  the  dead.”  The  soul  is  there,  though 
the  animal  existence  is  departed.  It  is' the  ghost  of  past  life, 
clear  and  firm  in  its  outlines,  and  spirit-like  in  its  talk — a  ver¬ 
itable  “  medium”  through  which  the  classical  ages  can  “  rap*’ 
out  their  ideas  to  ours.  There  is,  too,  enough  of  reality  and 


STREET  IN  POMPEII. 


174 


ITALIAN  SIGHTS  AND  PAPAL  PRINCIPLES. 


completeness  of  preservation  in  many  localities  to  make  one 
step  lightly,  for  fear  he  might  intrude.  This  gives  a  lively 
delicacy  of  feeling  to  exploration  totally  inconsistent  with  the 
hat-filled  towers  and  mouldy  ruins  of  ordinary  antiquity,  with 
their  hreak-neck  gaps  and  tottering  walls.  Here  every  thing 
has  the  freshness  of  yesterday  ;  all  is  firm  and  clean,  though 
incomplete.  By  some  strange  sorcery,  an  entire  city  has  been 
unroofed;  doors  and  windows  left  invitingly  open  ;  every  mys¬ 
tery  bared  to  strong  sunlight;  and  the  population,  as  it  were, 
extinguished,  like  the  snuffing  out  of  a  candle,  leaving  behind 
them  the  familiar  tokens  of  warm  hearts  and  a  busy  life,  so 
like  our  own  that  we  are  ready  at  once  to  extend  to  them 
the  fraternal  grasp  of  human  brotherhood. 

The  first  thought  that  struck  me  was  one  of  compliment  to 
the  departed  “  city  fathers.”  Their  streets  were  narrow,  it  is 
true — no  great  harm  in  a  hot  climate — but  well  paved  with 
fiat  lava,  and  raised  crossing-stones  for  foot-passengers.  They 
possessed  numerous  fountains,  and,  above  all,  “  side-walks,”  a 
convenience  which  Paris  did  not  know  before  this  century, 
and  Naples  is  still  without.  They  were  well  supplied  with 
sewers  beneath  the  pavement,  leading  to  the  sea.  From 
these  evidences  of  their  superior  civilization,  and  their  love  of 
fresh  water,  manifested  not  only  by  public  baths,  but  in  every 
private  house  of  any  pretensions,  in  beautiful  marble  fish-ba¬ 
sins,  fountains,  cisterns,  hot  and  cold  baths,  accompanied  with 
Oriental-like  tokens  of  luxurious  ablutions,  I  concluded  that 
the  filthy  habits  and  indecent  exposures  which  the  refined 
Florentines  gaze  upon  with  such  indifference,  even  under  the 
very  windows  of  their  stately  palaces,  to  which  are  hourly 
wafted  perfumes  not  of  Araby  the  blessed,  were  forbidden  by 
statute  at  Pompeii.  If  so,  the  modern  Italians  have  sadly  de¬ 
generated  from  their  ancestral  cleanliness. 

The  aqueducts  supplied  Pompeii  with  delicious  water,  as  I 


SCENE  IN  POMPEII 


176 


ITALIAN  SIGHTS  AND  PAPAL  PRINCIPLES. 


verified  by  taste.  Wells  are  rare,  and  the  water  not  so  good. 
There  is  one,  still  in  use,  one  hundred  and  twenty  feet  deep. 
The  names  and  occupations,  generally  in  red  paint,  accom¬ 
panied  often  with  hieroglyphical  signs,  announced  the  propri¬ 
etors  or  occupants  of  houses,  which  were  numbered,  and  their 
trades.  Indeed,  a  very  respectable  directory  of  Pompeii  might 
be  compiled  to-day  from  its  walls.  There  are  also  on  them 
many  advertisements  of  gladiatorial  shows,  festivals,  and 

specimens  of  street  wit  or  drawing,  from  which  might  be  got 
> 

up  an  Illustrated  Pompeian  News  of  the  year  A.D.  79,  which 
would  prove  vastly  entertaining. 

These  ideas  suggested  another.  Streets,  aqueducts,  fount¬ 
ains,  public  buildings,  and  private  houses — in  short,  all  the  es¬ 
sentials  of  a  habitable  town,  are  here,  ready  for  use,  and  re¬ 
quiring  not  an  extraordinary  degree  of  repair.  The  spirit  of 
Yankeedom  moved  within  me.  Would  it  not  be  a  “  good  op¬ 
eration”  to  buy  up  Pompeii,  reserve  the  corner  lots,  sell  the 
intervening,  and  appropriate  the  temples  to  public  schools  ? 
It  is  true  that  the  “  court-house”  would  require  roofing,  and  the 
jail  enlarging,  but  the  amphitheatre  would  be  a  capital  spot 
for  caucuses,  the  public  baths  could  be  altered  at  slight  ex¬ 
pense  into  a  “  meeting-house,”  with  ample  vestry  accommoda¬ 
tion,  and  the  Pantheon  would  make  a  capital  hotel.  The 
scream  of  the  locomotive  hourly  startles  the  ears  of  the  mod¬ 
ern  guests  of  Sallust’s  house  by  abruptly  recalling  them  from 
their  classical  trance  to  the  materialism  of  the  nineteenth  cen¬ 
tury,  so  that  a  rail-road  is  not  wanting,  and  gas  might  be  let 
on  cheap  from  Vesuvius.  Would  his  majesty  of  Naples  be¬ 
come  a  partner  in  the  speculation  ?  Knowing  his  predilection 
for  antiquities  rather  than  improvements,  I  “  rather  guessed” 
not,  and  concluded  to  keep  the  “  notion”  to  myself  until  a  more 
enterprising  ruler  should  arise  in  his  place. 

The  present  king  is,  however,  doing  something  in  the  way 


ITALIAN  SIGHTS  AND  PAPAL  PRINCIPLES. 


177 


of  repeopling  the  city,  for  he  allows  a  few  soldiers  to  select 
their  residences,  from  the  hundreds  at  their  choice,  in  the  dif¬ 
ferent  quarters  of  the  town.  A  trifling  outlay  gives  them  a 
very  comfortable  mansion.  They,  in  general,  content  them¬ 
selves,  like  hermit-crabs,  in  taking  possession  of  the  dead  shells 
of  the  plebeian  sort,  when  they  might  help  themselves  to  pal¬ 
aces.  It  looked  odd  to  see,  every  now  and  then,  the  solitude  of 
this  disinterred  city  broken  by  a  female  face,  gazing  hopelessly 
into  the  deserted  street,  watching  for  something  living  go  by. 
Luckily,  I  had  with  me  no  guide,  or  he  would  have  been  sure 
to  have  protested  that  these  inhabitants,  like  the  water  in  the 
w^ells,  were  not  ancient^  and  thus  dispel  an  illusion  I  had  cre¬ 
ated  out  of  them.  Why  could  they  not  have  been  the  families, 
nay,  the  very  soldiers  themselves,  who  perished,  rather  than 
desert  their  posts,  on  the  morning  of  the  twenty-fourth  of  Au¬ 
gust,  A.D.  79  ?  The  sentinel  was  found,  eighteen  centuries 
later,  still  at  his  post  at  the  Herculaneum  Gate,  while  in  their 
barracks  in  the  Forum  Nundinarium  more  than  threescore 
of  their  number  perished,  victims  to  their  military  discipline. 
Such  fidelity  deserves  perpetual  recompense,  and  my  fancy  in¬ 
vested  them  in  the  shape  of  the  present  legionaries  of  Naples 
wdth  the  freedom  of  the  city.  It  is  true  that  the  merit  of  four 
of  these  sufierers  was  involuntary.  They  were  not  only  lock¬ 
ed  up  in  the  guard-house,  but  fastened  by  their  ankles  into  iron 
stocks,  which  were  partially  melted  by  the  heat  that  slowly 
killed  them.  These  stocks  are  now  in  the  Museum,  as  well 
as  beautiful  specimens  of  armor,  including  several  bronze  hel¬ 
mets,  one  of  which  is  richly  ornamented  in  bas-relief  with  the 
story  of  the  destruction  of  Troy.  There  is,  however,  a  very 
curious  specimen  of  genuine  ancient  water  inclosed  in  a  huge 
bronze  cock  of  a  reservoir  to  be  seen  in  the  Museum.  Time 
has  hermetically  sealed  the  parts,  but,  upon  shaking  the  cock, 
the  splashing  of  the  imprisoned  liquid,  now  having  been 

H  2 


173 


ITALIAN  SIGHTS  AND  PAPAL  PRINCIPLES. 


nearly  two  thousand  years  in  solitary  confinement,  is  clearly 
heard. 

If  1  skip  oddly  about,  the  reader,  curious  in  these  matters, 
must  have  patience  with  me.  It  is  a  fac  simile  of  the  manner 
I  spent  this  day — my  pleasantest  day  of  travel  in  Europe — 
darting  from  one  point  to  another,  as  fancy  or  curiosity  dic¬ 
tated.  I  had  no  rule.  I  knew  by  heart  the  treasures  in  the 
Museo  Borbonico  which  had  been  rifled  hence,  and  could,  by 
the  wand  of  memory,  restore  them  to  their  proper  localities  ; 
consequently,  every  site  of  interest  became  to  me  at  once  the 
familiar  object  of  the  century  that  saw  our  Savior.  Then,  too, 
I  busied  myself  in  conjecturing,  from  the  hints  in  domestic  life 
the  Pompeians  had  left  behind  them,  how  they  did  this  thing 
— how  they  did  that ;  whether  we  were  wiser  and  more  re¬ 
fined  than  they  ;  were  we  even  more  comfortable,  with  all  our 
boasted  civilization ;  if,  reader  mine,  you  have  patience  to 
follow  me  through  all  my  eccentric  investigations  on  this  holi¬ 
day,  you  will  at  least  know  something  of  how  the  home-life  of 
the  old  conquerors  of  the  world  went  on  twenty  centuries  ago. 

Their  houses  were  not  large,  in  the  palatial  sense  of  modern 
times.  Unlike  ours,  too,  their  plain  side  was  toward  the  street, 
and  their  decorations  reserved  for  within.  Doors  which  open¬ 
ed  outward,  and  thereby  endangered  the  faces  of  the  passers- 
by,  unless  they  heard  the  warning  cry,  were  the  fashion.  The 
street  windows  were  mere  port-holes,  and  closed  with  wooden 
shutters,  so  that  street  effect,  so  far  as  domestic  architecture 
was  concerned,  must  have  been  meagre  indeed.  Art  was  lav¬ 
ish  in  decoration  of  the  interior.  The  colors  employed  in  paint¬ 
ing  were  peculiarly  bright,  retaining  even  now  a  brilliancy  that 
is  astonishing.  The  taste  was  in  general  for  strong  colors  and 
contrasts,  but  some  were  employed  with  a  delicacy  of  tint  and 
truthfulness  of  design  that  still  continue  to  bo  the  admiration 
and  study  of  modern  artists.  A  few  of  these  paintings  were 


ITALIAN  SIGHTS  AND  PAPAL  PRINCIPLES. 


179 


in  frames,  and  hung  upon  the  walls,  hut  in  general  they  were 
painted  upon  the  wall,  after  the  manner  of  modern  frescoes, 
and  with  so  durable  an  art  as  to  resist  until  now  the  fire  and 
damp  to  which  they  have  been  exposed.  Their  secret  of  thus 
petrifying  colors,  as  it  were,* is  lost. 

Among  the  finest  of  their  paintings,  classed  by  some  even 
with  the  labors  of  Raphael,  is  the  Parting  Scene  between 
Achilles  and  Briseis,  which  is  of  itself  sufficient  to  exalt  the 
feeling  of  the  ancients  for  art  to  a  high  standard.  The  head 
of  Achilles  is  a  master-piece  of  expression.  There  are  other 


evidences,  however,  of  their  faithful  delineation  of  sentiment 
and  passion,  accompanied  by  a  correctness  of  drawing,  which 
proves  much  close  study,  and,  with  other  branches  of  art  which 
this  insignificant  town  of  the  Roman  empire  has  disclosed, 


180 


ITALIAN  SIGHTS  AND  PAPAL  PRINCIPLES. 


shows  equally  how  little  we  have  gained  upon  them,  and  how 
great  must  have  been  the  intervening  darkness,  to  make  mod¬ 
ern  success  appear  so  wonderful.  Landscape  painting  was, 
however,  much  after  the  character  of  the  Chinese,  capricious, 
gaudy,  and  utterly  regardless  of  the  rules  of  perspective,  though 
there  are  evidences  that  this  branch  of  art  was  not  wholly 
misunderstood.  The  specimens  we  now  see  upon  the  walls, 
however,  were  probably  cheap  efforts,  to  take  the  place  of  mod¬ 
ern  paper,  and  not  intended  for  any  higher  purpose.  But  what 
they  chiefly  excelled  in  was  grotesque  and  arabesque  orna¬ 
ments,  in  both  of  which  they  display  a  pleasing  delicacy  and 
invention,  that  we  may  copy,  but  not  excel.  Indeed,  Raphael 
was  indebted  for  the  designs  of  his  ornamental  paintings  in 
the  Loggie  of  the  Vatican  to  the  Baths  of  Titus. 

In  the  kitchen  of  the  house  of  the  Edile  Pansa  there  still 
remain  some  droll  pictures,  coarsely  executed,  intended,  no 
doubt,  to  refresh  the  memory  of  the  cook  with  the  titbits  his 
master  loved,  and  perhaps  as  a  warning,  also,  in  case  of  a 
failure  of  skill.  We  have  a  ham,  bacon,  head  of  a  wild  boar, 
a  stately  hog  with  a  belt  around  his  body,  and  the  cook  sacri- 


PICTURE  JN  THE  HOUSE  OF  PANSA. 


ITALIAN  SIGHTS  AND  PAPAL  PRINCIPLES. 


181 


ficing  eatables  upon  an  altar,  with  the  guardian  serpents  be¬ 
neath.  Besides  these,  there  is  a  Moruna  fastened  upon  a  spit. 
This  delicate  fish  was  said  to  be  a  venomous  cross  between 
the  land  and  sea  viper.  It  was,  however,  particularly  prized 
by  Roman  epicures — we  can  forgive  classical  gourmands  ev¬ 
ery  thing  after  seasoning  their  dishes  with  asafoetida — and 
was  kept  in  brackish  water,  and  sometimes  fed  with  refracto¬ 
ry  slaves,  to  give  it  bulk  and  flavor.  There  was,  then,  an  un¬ 
mistakable  moral  to  Pansa’s  cook  in  this  picture. 

The  lower  floor  of  Pansa’s  house,  upon  the  street,  was  divid¬ 
ed  into  shops,  one  of  which  served  him  for  the  disposal  of  his 
own  superfluous  harvests.  Some  of  these  lordly  mansions 
boasted  an  immense  number  of  shops.  One,  owned  by  a 
Signora  Julia  Felix,  had  upon  the  outside  a  notice  stating 
that  it  was  to  let — I  presume  at  auction — between  the  coming 
sixth  and  eighth  of  August,  together  with  nine  hundred  shops, 
with  their  terraces  and  upper  stories.  This  amount  of  real  es¬ 
tate  in  a  little  city  like  this  looks  startling ;  but,  judging  from 
the  shops  already  exposed,  the  whole  might  be  included  within 
the  capacity  of  Stewart’s  marble  building  on  Broadway.  The 
ancient  aristocracy  peddled  out  their  merchandise  from  their 
own  houses,  as  still  continue  to  do  the  present  grand  signori  of 
Italy,  who,  while  affecting  to  despise  commerce  as  ignoble, 
daily  vend  wine  and  oil,  by  the  bottle  or  penny’s  worth,  to  ev¬ 
ery  customer,  from  the  basements  of  their  palaces.  The  alms 
they  bestow  at  one  door  are  often  returned  to  them  at  anoth¬ 
er,  through  the  sales  of  their  produce.  I  have  my  milk  and 
butter  of  a  marquis,  who,  if  I  sold  cotton  by  the  cargo,  would 
^consider  me  as  unworthy  of  his  noble  society,  but  who,  if  I  do 
nothing  and  patronize  his  dairy,  considers  me  good  enough  “■  to 
go  to  court.”  This  is  a  queer  distinction  for  the  descendants 
of  merchants  to  make,  but  it  is  universal.  Even  an  artist  is 
considered  in  some  degree  to  have  the  mechanical  taint  of  the 


182 


ITALIAN  SIGHTS  AND  PAPAL  PRINCIPLES. 


artisan,  an  aristocratic  prejudice  whicli  even  the  genius  of  our 
Greenough,  though  on  familiar  terms  with  a  Capponi,  could 
not  altogether  overcome. 

The  interior  view  of  the  Pompeian  houses  from  the  street 
must  have  been  very  pretty.  Unlike  the  modern  arrangement, 
the  ground  floor  was  the  principal  part,  for  the  ancient  Cam¬ 
panians  appear  to  have  had  a  luxurious  horror  of  staircases. 
Hence  those  that  we  see  in  private  houses  are  contracted,  and 
look  as  if  intended  only  for  slaves,  on  whom  devolved  the  la¬ 
bor  of  ascending  and  descending.  The  porter’s  lodge  was, 
where  it  is  now  in  fashionable  mansions,  just  inside  the  street- 
door.  This  looked  into  an  open  court,  in  the  centre  of  which  is 
always  to  be  found  an  “  im^pluvium^'  or  large,  open,  shallow  cis¬ 
tern  of  marble  to  hold  rain-water — an  exceedingly  ingenious 
contrivance,  one  would  suppose,  for  the  generation  of  musqui- 
toes.  Many  houses  had  also  large  subterranean  reservoirs. 

This  outer  court  was  surrounded  with  numerous  small  cham¬ 
bers,  appropriated  to  purposes  of  hospitality,  besides  the  larger 
reception-room,  or  atrium,  answering  to  modern  Italian  ante¬ 
chambers,  where  callers  were  obliged  to  await  the  pleasure  of 
the  master  of  the  house. 

Beyond  this  court  is  to  be  seen  another,  surrounded  in  gen¬ 
eral  by  colonnades,  and  appropriated  to  the  more  private  pur¬ 
poses  of  the  family.  Here  we  find  all  the  domestic  compart¬ 
ments  which  we  usually  divide  over  several  floors.  The  ladies 
had  their  boudoirs  and  the  gentlemen  their  libraries.  There 
are,  too,  saloons  of  different  degrees  of  elegance,  and  dining¬ 
rooms,  shady  and  very  inviting  in  such  a  climate,  looking  out 
as  they  did  upon  mosaic-paved  court-yards,  cooled  by  fount-^ 
ains,  and  the  murmuring  of  flowing  waters  playing  among 
marble  statues  and  flower-beds,  with  gold  fishes  darting  about 
in  their  artificial  ponds.  When  space  permitted,  there  was  al¬ 
ways  a  garden,  shaded  by  vine-covered  trellises  supported  on 


ITALIAN  SIGHTS  AND  PAPAL  PRINCIPLES. 


183 


beautiful  columns,  under  which  the  family  assembled  pert 

to  eat  mes”-at  all  events,  to  drink  iced  wine  Here 
were  the  cold  ,  -nere,  i 

baths.  These  were  taken  in  the  open  air,  v 


184 


ITALIAN  SIGHTS  AND  PAPAL  PRINCIPLES. 


a  somewhat  nonchalant  disregard  of  exposure  universal  in 
warm  countries.  Some  of  the  bath-tubs,  of  the  purest  white 
marble,  are  of  magnificent  proportions,  and  look  as  invitingly 
under  the  warm  sky  of  to-day  as  when  Grecian  belles  were 
wont  to  bathe  their  fair  limbs  therein.  The  hot  baths  were, 
from  necessity,  more  retired.  The  farther  end  of  the  garden 
was  frequently  painted  in  fresco  landscape,  so  that  the  passer¬ 
by  in  the  street  beheld  a  beautiful  perspective  of  Corinthian 
columns,  fountains,  statues,  and  mosaic-paved  court-yards,  ter¬ 
minating  with  flowers  and  shrubbery,  and  apparently  betray¬ 
ing  a  vista  far  beyond  the  reality.  The  effect  of  such  a  scene, 
combined  with  the  graceful-flowing  robes  of  the  ancients,  and 
their  careless  out-door  domesticity,  generated  by  a  climate 
which  invites  freedom,  must  have  been  charmingly  pictur¬ 
esque. 

The  chambers  were  in  general  mere  closets,  altogether  too 
small  for  modern  bedsteads,  and  lighted  only  by  doors.  In 
fact,  the  bedstead  was  seldom  other  than  a  raised  portion  of 
the  floor,  though  they  possessed  others  somewhat  after  the 
modern  French  pattern,  as  may  be  seen  pictured  on  the  walls. 
No  doubt,  inspired  by  the  genial  warmth  of  their  climate,  the 
Pompeians  spread  their  mattresses,  as  they  did  their  tables, 
as  fancy  dictated.  It  was  an  easy  matter  with  them  to  take 
up  their  beds  and  walk.  The  women’s  apartments  were  sep¬ 
arated  from  the  men’s,  though  the  division  does  not  appear  to 
have  been  very  close.  Every  house  had  its  family  altar  or 
chapel,  not  unlike  in  arrangement  to  the  domestic  shrines  of 
Romanism,  substituting  an  idol  for  a  crucifix  or  Madonna. 
They  burned  lamps,  just  as  the  Catholics  do  candles,  as  a  re¬ 
ligious  sacrifice,  and  ofiered  fruits  and  flowers,  or  more  valu¬ 
able  gifts,  as  vows  or  piety  dictated. 

Some  of  the  better  houses  had  their  kitchens  and  their  of¬ 
fices  under  ground,  but-,  in  general,  they  were  put  aside  where 


ITALIAN  SIGHTS  AND  PAPAL  PRINCIPLES. 


185 


most  convenient,  approachable  by  a  lane  or  back  passage. 
They  were  all  small  compared  with  our  ideas  of  culinary  ac¬ 
commodation,  but  almost  precisely  like  the  modern  Italian  in 
their  arrangements.  The  iire-places  are  precisely  the  same. 
But  when  we  come  to  kitchen  utensils,  we  perceive  a  degener¬ 
acy,  not  only  in  material  and  form,  but  in  utility,  compared 
with  those  in  common  use  among  the  Pompeians,  that  is  truly 
marvelous.  Bronze,  lined  with  silver,  was  not  uncommon.  I 
saw  at  the  Museum  pots  with  malleable  bronze  handles,  which 
could  be  put  in  or  ta¬ 
ken  out  at  pleasure. 

This  art  is  lost.  Their 
earthen  jars  have  the 
ring  of  real  metal,  hard 
and  sonorous,  and  so 
strong  as  to  be  proof 
against  ordinary  care¬ 
lessness.  Their  potte¬ 
ry  is  grace  itself,  and 
some  of  the  ornament¬ 
al  vases  of  antiquity 
are  valued  as  high  as 
ten  thousand  dollars 
apiece.  The  elegance 
of  form  and  beauty  of 
color  of  their  glass — I 
refer  to  the  finest  spec¬ 
imens — astonished  me. 

Modern  art  has  never 
equaled  the  Portland 
vase,  or  rivaled  the 
finest  specimens  of  Na¬ 
ples,  which  seem  more 


CANDELABRA  AND  VASE. 


186 


ITALIAN  SIGHTS  AND  PAPAL  PRINCIPLES. 


like  engraved  gems  than  glass.  Their  common  is  like  our 
greenish  bottle-glass.  They  do  not  seem  to  have  possessed 
the  art  of  cutting,  though  we  find  pretty  specimens  of  pressed 
glass,  such  as  vases,  drinking-vessels,  &c. 

Their  chief  excellence  lay  in  their  metallic  work.  In  cas¬ 
seroles,  water-jars,  wine-coolers,  pots  and  kettles,  strainers, 
egg-containers,  urns  for  hot  water — in  short,  throughout  the 

whole  range  of  domes¬ 
tic  ware,  they  display 
not  only  a  variety  equal 
to  any  modern  furnish¬ 
ing  house,  but  in  many 
respects,  especially  in 
stoves,  water  -  heaters, 
&c.,  an  economy  of  fuel 
and  multiplicity  of  uses 
that  wmuld  win  a  patent 
even  at  W ashington.  To 
these  merits  they  add  a 
beauty  of  form  altogeth- 

LAMP  AND  STAND.  1  ,1V 

er  neglected  by  our  un- 
poetical  mechanics.  Nothing,  however  homely  in  its  uses, 
was  beneath  their  passion  for  adornment.  A  handle  of  a 
pitcher  or  the  leg  of  a  pot  became,  as  it  left  their  hands, 
suggestive  of  something  beyond  its  baser  uses.  It  possess¬ 
ed  a  distinctive  beauty,  and  told  a  history.  Their  mythol¬ 
ogy  was  pressed  into  this  apparently  humble  service,  so  that 
stories  of  religion  might  be  learned  from  a  table  service. 
This  prodigality  of  art  must  have  cost  high.  It  expands  our 
idea  of  the  riches  and  civilization  of  the  Roman  empire  to 
know  that  a  petty  sea-port  afibrds  such  incontestable  evidence 
of  taste  and  wealth.  If  such  were  provincial  Pompeii,  what 
must  have  been  imperial  Rome  I 


ITALIAN  SIGHTS  AND  PAPAL  PRINCIPLES 


187 


In  the  days  of  Titus,  Pompeii  was  dug  over  and  rifled  of 
much  of  its  buried  treasure,  probably  by  surviving  inhabit¬ 
ants,  who  knew  where  to  seek.  In  one  instance  modern  ex¬ 
cavators  have  discovered  that  their  predecessors  c\  the  first 
century  failed  only  by  three  feet  in  hitting  a  treasure  which 
they  evidently  sought,  but  which  was  destined  to  reward  the 
King  of  Naples  nearly  two  thousand  years  afterward.  Pom¬ 
peii  was  evidently  preserved  by  Fate  to  daguerreotype  ancient 
to  modern  civilization,  and  teach  us  that,  with  all  our  boasted 
progress,  we  can  learn  much  from  the  past.  Indeed,  its  uten¬ 
sils  and  arts  have  been  for  the  last  fifty  years  a  school  of  de¬ 
sign  to  modern  Europe,  which  has  advanced  in  beauty  and 
grace  of  ornament  in  proportion  as  it  has  gone  back  for  mod¬ 
els.  The  elegant  designs  of  their  candelabra,  lamps,  urns,  and 
silver  vases,  are  copied  throughout  the  civilized  world.  I  be¬ 
lieve  that  more  bronze  and  marble  statues  have  been  dug  out 
of  Pompeii  than  exist  in  the  entire  United  States.  It  was  said 
of  Rome  that  the  stone  population  equaled  the  living.  It  was 
not  the  comparative  cheapness  of  art  that  made  it  so  common, 
for  excellence  was  rated  at  greater  sums  than  now.  Phidias 
or  Praxiteles  could  command  higher  prices  than  can  Powers 
or  Crawford  in  the  present  age.  The  living  masters  of  antiq¬ 
uity  were  rewarded  as  are  only  the  dead  by  modern  taste. 
Nothing  but  an  inborn  and  cultivated  sense  of  the  beautiful 
could  have  produced  this  artistic  prodigality.  There  is  some¬ 
thing  in  this  acknowledgment  and  craving  for  Beauty — the 
unselfish,  or,  more  properly  speaking,  intellectual  exaltation 
of  art  above  mere  utility,  that  strikes  me  as  a  generous  senti¬ 
ment  in  a  nation.  It  came  from  the  hearts  and  purses  of  in¬ 
dividuals,  and  was  not  the  result  of  one  tyrannical  will,  like 
that  of  Louis  XIV.,  who  willingly  impoverished  France  that 
he  might  lodge  in  egotistical  magnificence. 

In  one  other  respect  the  Pompeians,  in  common  with  an- 


188 


ITALIAN  SIGHTS  AND  PAPAL  PRINCIPLES. 


tiquity,  are  not  so  deserving  of  commendation.  What  St.  Paul 
says  of  the  Corinthians  must  have  been  equally  applicable  to 
them.  Their  religion  was  purely  a  sensual  one  in  its  effect 
on  the  common  mind.  It  stimulated  rather  than  repressed 
vulgar  passions  by  celestial  examples  of  more  than  human  in¬ 
firmity.  Hence,  in  conjunction  with  excitability  of  climate, 
sprang  licentious  habits  and  erotic  ideas.  The  secret  muse¬ 
um  of  Naples  discloses  a  curious  picture  of  the  domestic  life 
of  the  inhabitants  of  Magna  Grsecia.  Common  utensils,  orna¬ 
mental  vases,  and  even  jewelry,  were  manufactured  into  ob¬ 
scene  shapes,  which  no  modern  lady  could  hear  named,  much 
less  see  and  use,  without  the  blush  of  shame  and  indignation. 
It  would  be  a  difficult  point  to  fix  upon  the  standard  of  class¬ 
ical  modesty.  It  was,  at  all  events,  the  antipodes  of  Amer¬ 
ican  delicacy,  which  coins  new  names  to  avoid  expressing 
natural  ideas,  and  discloses  more  from  false  shame  in  substi¬ 
tution  than  the  natural  truth  could  ever  express,  however 
frankly  spoken.  Christianity  has  banished  forever  from  civil¬ 
ized  life  such  evidence  of  its  classical  abasement.  The  pic¬ 
tures  of  antiquity,  too,  were  not  always  of  the  most  chaste  de¬ 
scription,  and  forms  of  vice  were  unblushingly  delineated 
which  are  not  so  much  as  even  to  be  named  among  men.  The 
Neapolitan  government,  though  not  remarkable  for  prudery, 
has  erased  or  hid  these  specimens  of  prurient  art.  It  leaves, 
however,  as  specimens  of  the  manners  of  the  day,  upon  a  few 
buildings,  stone  amulets  in  the  shape  of  any  thing  the  reader 
may  conceive  as  particularly  immodest,  but  which  were  once 
publicly  worn,  after  the  fashion  of  modern  charms,  by  Pom¬ 
peian  ladies,  as  a  specific  against  malocchio,  or  the  evil  eye. 
This  superstition  is  still  rife  throughout  Italy,  and  affords  jew¬ 
elers  much  custom.  Turning  a  corner  suddenly,  I  heard  the 
strange  sound  of  English  voices,  and  came  upon  a  party  of  that 
nation.  A  young  girl,  in  her  simplicity,  was  intently  studying 


ITALIAN  SIGHTS  AND  PAPAL  PRINCIPLES. 


189 


one  of  these  mystic  carvings  over  a  doorway,  while  behind  her 
sat  a  courier,  in  high  enjoyment  of  w’hat  he  considered  a  good 
joke.  He  gave  me  a  wink  and  laugh  as  I  went  by.  At  the 
same  instant  a  revelation  seemed  to  spring  into  the  mind  of 
the  maiden,  and  she  hurried  off  as  if  a  bee  had  stung  her. 

Since  the  visit  of  Pius  IX.  to  Naples,  the  public  museums 
have  become  wonderfully  chaste.  He  condemned  every  dis¬ 
play  of  classical  beauty,  while  tolerating  any  amount  of  saintly 
nakedness.  A  Domenichino  and  Guido  are  packed  away  into 
dark  closets  if  they  display  any  thing  less  of  female  loveliness 
than  court  costume  sanctions,  while  a  Saint  Therese,  an  arrow- 
spitted  Sebastian,  or  any  other  Romish  pet,  in  all  their  repul¬ 
sive  nudity  of  martyrdom,  are  allowed  to  disgust  mortal  eyes 
under  the  specious  pretense  of  offering  unction  to  their  souls. 
Some  of  the  popes  have  manifested  a  wonderfully  keen  scent 
in  detecting  immodesty  in  paintings  that  have  escaped  that 
imputation  through  centuries  of  visitors.  It  certainly  looks 
like  a  weak  spot  in  their  imaginations.  The  obscene  gallery 
at  Naples  is  very  properly  closed  to  the  public  ;  so  should  ev¬ 
ery  work  of  art  in  which  immodesty  is  obviously  apparent. 
But  to  be  sensitive  over  impassible  marble,  or  even  alarmed 
at  the  warm  coloring  of  Titian,  does  not  always  imply  a  chaste 
mind.  High  art  exalts  what  it  touches.  It  can  not  descend 
to  foulness.  An  artist  of  pure  aim  should  not  be  held  answer- 
able  for  the  imagination  of  the  spectator.  It  is  his  business  to 
purify  his  heart,  even  as  the  artist  has  purified  his  work,  of  all 
gross,  earthly  elements.  Hence  the  prudery  of  the  papal  court, 
in  the  exuberance  of  the  ridiculous  metallic  disguises  they 
give  their  statuary,  is  any  thing  but  suggestive  of  modesty.  If 
the  present  pope  is  bent  upon  clothing  the  statuesque  world, 
I  would  respectfully  call  his  attention  to  the  colossal  bronze 
Neptune  at  Bologna,  by  John  of  the  same  name,  which  is  in¬ 
dubitably  an  indecent  figtire.  But  I  am  sure  that  the  simplest 


190 


ITALIAN  SIGHT'S  AND  PAPAL  PRINCIPLES. 


maiden  can  walk  tlie  Uffizii  Gallery  at  Florence,  in  all  its 
majesty  of  art,  with  as  uncontaminated  a  mind  as  she  can  the 
reformed  galleries  of  Itome  and  Naples,  in  their  tin-leaf  drape¬ 
ries.  On  the  ceilings  of  the  Uffizii,  I  am  sorry  that  truth  com¬ 
pels  me  to  add,  there  actually  exist  real  obscenities,  fortunate¬ 
ly  difficult  to  detect  amid  the  multitude  of  arabesques,  but 
as  palpably  vicious  as  any  thing  Pompeian.  They  afford  in¬ 
contestable  evidence  of  the  decline  of  pure  art,  and  depravity 
of  manners  resulting  from  the  overlauded  Medician  rule,  which, 
for  the  credit  of  the  present  age,  should  be  obliterated. 

Like  the  modern  Italians,  the  Pompeians,  in  their  eagerness 
for  the  ornamental,  to  which,  it  must  be  confessed,  they  did 
not  always  bring  good  taste,  often  overlooked  the  useful  and 
essential.  I  doubt  if  there  are  any  good  carpenters,  according 
to  the  American  standard,  in  all  Italy  or  on  the  Continent  gen¬ 
erally.  The  same  deficiency  in  well-finished  mechanical  work 
obtained  as  extensively  in  ancient  times.  Nicely-adjusted 
locks,  convenient  door-handles,  well-jointed  carpentry,  level 
Poors — in  short,  the  evidences  of  mechanical  skill  in  the  home¬ 
liest  objects  of  domestic  use,  which  are  considered  as  indis¬ 
pensable  to  comfort  in  America,  are  unknown  in  Italy.  Their 
lamps,  with  all  their  beauty,  were  smoky,  inconvenient  arti¬ 
cles.  Neither  their  streets  or  houses  could  be  cleanly  lighted. 
I  do  not  believe  that  the  general  condition  of  the  merely  me¬ 
chanical  arts  has  improved  or  retrograded  in  Italy  for  twenty 
centuries.  In  masonry  and  stucco-work,  the  ancients  excelled 
the  moderns.  Roman  brick-work  is  like  adamant  in  solidity. 
The  Pompeian  doors  were  usually  bivalve,  and  turned  on  piv¬ 
ots.  All  the  external  ornaments  were  elegantly  wrought. 
Dolts,  keys,  and  handles  are  found  of  beautiful  and  capricious 
desi(>-ns,  but  iron-work  for  internal  use  was  most  bunglingly 

O  * 

made. 

Modern  belles  have  certainly  some  decided  advantages  in 


ITALIAN  SIGHTS  AND  PAPAL  PRINCIPLES. 


191 


the  variety  and  beauty  of  objects  of  toilette  and  jewelry  since 
Paris  has  developed  her  taste  and  resources  for  their  adorn¬ 
ment.  The  fair  Pompeians  were,  however,  by  no  means  de¬ 
ficient  in  these  respects,  and  even  now,  in  full  costume,  would 
attract  no  small  admiration  beside  the  stars  of  the  Tuileries. 
Their  mirrors  were  usually  of  steel,  and  sometimes  of  glass, 
manufactured  at  Sidon,  which  was  the  Venice  of  that  day  in 
that  respect.  But,  upon  reflection,  I  must  add,  that  however 
elegant  in  frame,  they  could  by  no  means  maintain  a  steady 
countenance  beside  French  plate.  Pins  they  had,  but  they 
would  not  sell  nowadays  alongside  the  Birming¬ 
ham.  In  their  haste  to  escape,  the  ladies  left  be¬ 
hind  them  many  tokens  of  disturbed  toilettes, 
with  the  usual  variety  of  vanity-ware.  Some  of 
their  rings,  pins,  brooches, 
and  cameos  have  found  mod¬ 
ern  imitators  in  modern  art,  • 
and  are  as  much  admired  in 
the  year  eighteen  hundred 
and  fifty-four  of  Our  Lord  as 
they  were  in  the  year  one. 

The  Pompeian  jewelers  have 
given  designs  to  many  of  our  choicest  ornaments. 
They,  I  dare  say,  in  their  turn,  stole  them  from 
Greece,  which  stole  them  from  Egypt.  There  was  no  lack  of 
cosmetics,  and,  for  arrangement  of  hair,  judging  from  female 
busts,  our  ladies  have,  as  yet,  discovered  no  modes  more  be¬ 
coming  than  those  of  the  classical  ages.  Forks  are  a  modern 
invention,  the  Pv^omans  preferring  their  fingers,  as  they  did  also 
to  recline  at  table,  in  a  scantiness  of  clothing  quite  the  reverse 
of  modern  ideas  of  a  dinner  toilet. 

In  a  rich  commercial  town,  as  Pompeii  undoubtedly  was, 
one  would  expect  to  find  more  treasure  in  coin,  especially  as 


192  ITALIAN  SIGHTS  AND  PAPAL  PRINCIPLES. 


paper  currency  was  unknown,  than  as  yet  has  proved  the  case. 
Occasionally  a  secret  deposit,  \vhich  has  remained  intact  for  a 
period  long  beyond  the  desires  of  the  owner  when  he  laid  it 
hy  against  a  rainy  day,  rewards  the  modern  explorer.  In  one 
house,  near  the  Forum,  the  workmen  were  astonished  hy  a 
shower  of  gold  coins,  fifty-six  in  number,  as  large  and  bright 
as  new  half  eagles,  which  tumbled  from  a  chink  in  the  wall. 
These  were  soon  after  followed  hy  a  pile  of  silver  money,  con¬ 
solidated  by  heat  into  one  mass,  and  a  silver  spoon.  But  there 
are  evidences  that  Pompeii  was  explored  before  the  lava  which 
covered  it  had  cooled.  It  was  not  so  deep  as  now  hy  several 
feet,  as  succeeding  eruptions  have  deposited  over  it  successive 
strata.  In  one  spot,' some  twelve  feet  above  the  pavements, 
several  skeletons  were  found,  with  money,  jewels,  and  plate, 
which  they  had  succeeded  in  obtaining,  but  their  avarice, 
prompting  them  to  longer  search,  had  caused  them  to  fall  vic¬ 
tims  to  the  mei)hitic  gases  which  arose  from  the  then  smoking 


mass. 


ITALIAN  SIGHTS  AND  PAPAL  PRINCIPLES. 


193 


The  roofs  of  Pompeii  were  in  general  flat,  and  of  wood ; 
consequently,  they  were  either  crushed  in  or  set  on  fire  by  the 
hot  stones  and  ashes.  The  accumulated  soil  on  top  of  the 
buildings  supports  a  young  growth  of  trees,  and  is  occupied  by 
a  farm.  The  process  of  disinterment  is  so  slow — a  few  men 
and  carts  only,  at  the  annual  cost  of  less  than  a  thousand  dol¬ 
lars,  being  employed  that,  at  the  present  rate,  centuries  must 
elapse  before  the  entire  city  is  uncovered.  In  the  mean  while, 
a  goodly  portion  of  the  unprotected  parts  must  fall  into  irre¬ 
deemable  ruins.  It  could  be  easily  exposed  in  one  year,  and 
there  is  no  doubt  that,  as  a  speculation,  if  the  sale  of  antiqui¬ 
ties  were  allowed,  it  would  be  profitable  to  hasten  operations. 
The  parts  yet  unexplored — nearly  three  quarters  of  the  town — 
promise  well.  Though  the  Neapolitan  government  protract 
their  work  to  a  degree  that  puts  every  antiquarian  heart  into 
a  fever  of  impatience,  yet  what  it  does  is  thoroughly  done. 
The  streets  and  buildings  are  restored  to  a  degree  of  cleanli¬ 
ness  which  would  gladden  the  hearts  of  the  dainty  Pompei¬ 
ans  to  witness  ;  the  dilapidated  parts  of  sufficient  interest  to 
warrant  preservation  are  sufficiently  repaired  to  prevent  far¬ 
ther  injury  from  the  weather,  and  every  work  of  art  that  can 
not  be  removed  to  the  museum  is  securely  roofed  in  and  placed 
under  guardianship.  But  they  do  not  do  enough.  One  of  the 
best  mansions  should  be  restored  to  its  condition  as  it  stood 
previous  to  its  enthralment.  This  could  be  done  by  causing 
the  Museo  Borbonico  to  disgorge  some  of  its  superfluous 
wealth  of  antiquity.  It  would  not  be  difficult  to  restore  the 
luxurious  Sallust  s  house  or  Biomedes’s  villa  to  its  actual  con¬ 
dition  of  furniture,  ornament,  and  arrangement,  as  they  existed 
when  their  title-deeds  were  in  their  builders’  hands.  What 
correct  ideas  might  we  not  then  possess  of  the  home-life  of  the 
Roman  gentleman !  The  public  buildings  are  more  interest¬ 
ing  as  they  are,  but  a  perfect  Roman  house  would  be  a  gem 

I 


194 


ITALIAN  SIGHTS  AND  PAPAL  PRINCIPLES. 


of  antiquity.  So  far  from  entertaining  an  enterprise  of  this 
sort,  the  King  of  Naples  seems  to  regard  Pompeii  as  a  play¬ 
house  for  royalty.  Houses  which  give  evidence  of  being  rich 
in  spoil  are  uncovered  only  to  a  certain  depth,  and  kept  until 
a  royal  visitor  arrives.  The  King  of  Naples  makes  up  a  party, 
and  the  work  is  finished  for  its  amusement.  I  believe  he  pre¬ 
sents  his  visitor  with  whatever  is  found  ;  but  that  he  is  mean 
enough  to  republican  sovereigns  like  myself,  I  can  testify. 
On  approaching  the  street  where  exploration  was  in  progress, 
a  soldier  watched  me  as  closely  as  if  I  had  myself  been  a  dis¬ 
interred  Pompeian  preparing  to  serve  on  him  notice  of  a  writ 
of  ejectment.  There  were  human  bones,  broken  amphorae, 
charred  wood,  pottery,  and  other  tokens  of  discovery  lying 
about.  They  had  just  disclosed  a  massive  doorway,  on  which 
the  owner’s  name  was  as  fresh  as  if  written  but  that  morninsf. 
Above  was  a  window  and  burned  beams.  The  carts  were 
taking  off  the  mingled  charcoal  and  ashes,  and  throwing  it 
away  outside  of  the  walls.  I  picked  up  a  morsel  of  the  char¬ 
coal  no  bigger  than  a  walnut.  The  wood  was  so  perfectly 
carbonized  that  it  left  not  a  particle  of  grit  to  the  taste,  and  it 
was  as  easily  dissolved  in  the  mouth  as  sugar.  The  soldier 
saw  my  motion,  rushed  forward  and  seized  the  remnant  I  had 
not  taken,  roughly  telling  me  that  I  must  not  so  much  as 
touch  even  a  cinder  in  Pompeii.  How  I  was  to  avoid  that 
when  the  entire  soil  was  ashes,  he  did  not  condescend  to  ex¬ 
plain,  but  eyed  me  like  a  lynx,  for  fear  I  should  take  another 
taste.  It  may  be  that  Pompeian  charcoal  has  a  market  value 
at  Naples.  His  Majesty  sells  the  old  lead  and  bronze,  and 
why  not  the  charcoal  ?  Up  to  that  time  I  had  not  thought  of 
picking  up  a  souvenir.  Soon  after,  however,  finding  a  pretty 
specimen  of  mosaic  pavement,  T  put  it  into  my  pocket,  and, 
knowing  the  house  whence  it  came,  I  am  prepared  to  account 
for  the  same  to  the  lawful  heirs  whenever  they  shall  call. 


ITALIAN  SIGHTS  AND  PAPAL  PRINCIPLES. 


195 


I  took  more  pleasure  in  examining  the  private  than  the  pub¬ 
lic  buildings.  The  former  told  of  individual  life,  while  the 
latter  gave  only  general  ideas  common  to  all  nations.  It  was 
pleasant  to  speculate  upon  the  supposed  tastes  and  habits  of 
the  departed  families  from  the  traces  of  their  every-day  exist¬ 
ence  that  the  crater  had,  as  it  were,  embalmed  for  all  time. 
In  one  of  the  shops  attached  to  Parisa’s  house  there  is  a  Latin 
cross  of  stucco  in  bas-relief.  May  this  not  indicate  that  the 
proprietor  was  aNazarene,  a  disciple  of  Jesus,  whom  perhaps 
he  had  seen  and  heard  while  on  a  commercial  visit  to  Judea? 
Perhaps  he  had  received  his  faith  from  the  apostle  of  the 
Gentiles  when  he  disembarked  at  Puteoli !  This  cross  is  the 
more  extraordinary,  as  it  is  in  company  with  the  usual  sym¬ 
bols  of  heathen  mythology,  as  if  the  convert  either  feared  the 
popular  opinion  too  much  to  banish  them  altogether  from  his 
house,  or  he  was  superstitiously  inclined  to  try  the  efficacy  of 
both  opinions. 

I  entered  one  house  which  I  am  positive  belonged  to  an  old 
maid  of  the  most  precise  order.  It  was  a  real  bijou.  Every 
thing  was  on  a  Liliputian  scale.  The  mosaic  pavements, 
paintings,  and  marble  were  all  neatly  beautiful.  The  garden 
was  not  much  larger  than  a  pocket-handkerchief,  yet  it  con¬ 
tained  statues,  fountains,  urns,  and  ornaments  of  great  variety, 
all  well  executed  and  tastefully  arranged.  The  chapel  looked 
like  a  baby-house,  and  as  if  got  up  to  play  at  religion.  Who¬ 
ever  owned  these  premises  evidently  enjoyed  them,  and  found 
their  all  of  life  within  their  diminutive  precincts. 

In  striking  contrast  to  this  house,  both  for  dimensions  and 
grandeur,  is  that  commonly  called  the  House  of  the  Ciuses- 
tor.  In  extent  and  richness  of  ornament  it  is  almost  a  pal¬ 
ace,  occupying  a  space  of  about  one  hundred  feet  deep  by 
one  hundred  and  fifty  front.  It  was  particularly  rich  in 
paintings :  among  them,  Perseus  and  Andromeda,  and  Medea 


196 


ITALIAN  SIGHTS  AND  PAPAL  PRINCIPLES. 


meditating  the  murder  of  her  children,  given  with  much  feel¬ 
ing  and  vigor.  In  the  garden,  leaning  against  the  wall  of  the 
colonnade,  are  rows  of  wine-jars,  just  as  they  were  placed  in 
the  year  79  to  receive  the  vintage.  The  columns  and  pilas¬ 
ters  are  coated  with  the  most  beautiful  stucco,  firm  as  stone, 
and  highly  polished,  and  as  perfect  to-day  as  if  fresh  from  the 
finisher’s  hands.  On  one,  some  idler  of  taste  has  scratched, 
with  a  hard  instrument,  a  well-executed  drawing,  and  written 
beneath  an  inscription  in  Greek.  Were  the  author  to  return, 
so  delicately  has  Time  treated  his  labor,  that  the  long  interval 
would  seem  to  him  but  a  yesterday. 

A  “  custode”  cultivates  a  portion  of  the  garden,  and  has  fit¬ 
ted  up  one  of  the  many  rooms  of  this  mansion  for  a  dwelling. 
He  invited  me  in,  and  showed  me  quite  a  numerous  collection 
of  interesting  fragments  of  the  former  luxury  which  reigned  in 
this  abode.  There  still  exists  a  large  money-chest,  lined  with 
brass  and  coated  with  iron,  partially  decomposed  by  heat. 
The  locks,  handles,  and  ornaments  were  of  bronze.  A  quan¬ 
tity  of  gold  and  silver  coin  was  found  within  it,  but  the  chief 
part  had  been  extracted  by  the  primitive  explorers,  who  cal¬ 
culated  very  nicely  as  to  its  locality.  They  dug  into  the  ad¬ 
joining  chamber,  and,  finding  their  mistake,  pierced  the  wall 
and  cut  into  the  chest,  but  were  unable  to  reach  all  its  con¬ 
tents.  Probably  it  was  hot  work,  and  they  were  obliged  to 
make  dispatch. 

In  the  Pompeian  houses  there  was  none  of  that  jealous  re¬ 
gard  for  personal  privacy  or  delicacy  that  characterizes  mod¬ 
ern  domestic  architecture.  This  moral  deficiency  produced 
greater  freedom  of  design  and  arrangement  in  the  suite  of 
rooms,  so  that  their  general  effect  was  much  superior  to  our 
mode  of  building.  One  of  the  most  superior  of  the  smaller 
houses  is  known  as  that  of  the  Tragic  Poet,  a  whimsical  ap¬ 
pellation,  like  many  others,  without  much  reason.  The  first 


ITALIAN  SIGHTS  AND  PAPAL  PRINCIPLES. 


197 


object  that  meets  the  eye  upon  the  threshold  is  a  fierce  dog, 
in  mosaic,  apparently  in  the  act  of  springing  upon  the  visitor. 
Beneath  is  the  inscription  “  Cave  CanerrC' — Look  out  for  the 
dog.  This  mosaic  is  a  substitute  for  the  original,  which  has 


V 


O  ^ 

O  0 

o  <> 

£■ 


been  removed  to  Naples.  The  proprietor  was  doubtless  a 
wag,  who  hit  upon  this  Irish  welcome  to  his  friends,  or  else 
some  literary  lion,  the  Bulwer  or  Longfellow  of  his  day,  who 
thus  delicately  hinted  his  disinclination  to  be  bored  by  auto¬ 
graph  hunters  and  anecdote  collectors.  The  so-called  House 
of  the  Yestals,  which  I  believe  to  be  a  decided  misnomer,  has 
the  ambiguous  inscription  — Welcome — upon  its  floor. 

Its  decorations  are  not  remarkable,  as  the  name  would  imply, 
for  chaste  conception.  The  paintings  found  in  the  House  of 
the  Tragic  Poet  are  singularly  beautiful,  as  are  also  its  wall- 
decorations.  A  profusion  of  jewels  and  female  ornaments 
were  discovered  here  beside  some  skeletons.  The  expense 
upon  mosaic  floors  alone  in  this  and  some  other  houses  must 
have  been  enormous,  for  it  is  not  to  be  presumed  that  the  art 
was  cheaper  then  than  now,  while  the  execution,  in  general. 


198 


ITALIAN. SIGHTS  AND  PAPAL  PRINCIPLES. 


was  much  superior.  The  material  is  the  same  as  that  now 
used  in  the  Vatican  manufactory — glass,  of  which  there  are 
eleven  thousand  different  shades  of  colors.  By  it  the  ancients 
gave  the  minutest  features  and  varied  expressions  of  the  hu¬ 
man  countenance  with  wonderful  delicacy  and  effect.  The 
mosaic  of  the  Choragus  instructing  the  Actors  was  found  in  the 
house  of  the  Tragic  Poet.  As  beautiful  as  this  is,  it  is  sur¬ 
passed  by  the  celebrated  Battle  of  Issus,  found  in  the  House 
of  the  Faun.  Although  but  a  fragment  of  a  larger  picture,  it 
represents  twelve  horses,  twenty-two  persons,  and  a  large  war- 
chariot  of  nearly  life-size.  It  is  executed  with  great  vigor 
and  truth,  giving  a  portrait  of  Alex'ander  and  his  war-horse 
Bucephalus,  besides  Darius  and  his  guards,  the  whole  display¬ 
ing  a  knowledge  of  art  in  foreshortening,  drawing  generally, 
grouping,  and  the  management  of  light  and  shade,  but  little 
inferior  to  the  best  modern  works. 

The  House  of  Sallust  recalls  a  custom  which  one  would  sup¬ 
pose  would  have  been  more  honored  in  the  breach  than  the 
observance.  The  family  oratory  represents  the  household 
gods,  or  Lares,  with  a  serpent.  These  reptiles  were  supposed 
to  watch  over  the  family.  Their  images  were  to  the  old  Ro¬ 
mans  what  the  cross  is  to  the  modern  Italian,  endowed  with 
peculiar  sanctity,  and  on  that  account  frequently  painted  or 
placed  on  spots  which  were  desired  to  be  kept  undefiled,  but 
which  the  Anglo-Saxon  much  better  protects  by  the  simple 
notice,  “  Commit  no  nuisance.”  Whenever  these  tutelary  genii 
did  not  answer  the  expectation  of  their  worshipers,  they  were 
treated  with  as  little  respect  as  a  Roman  Catholic  pays  to  his 
patron  saint  when  disappointed  of  his  miraculous  intervention. 
They  were  cursed,  and  kicked  out  of  doors,  to  make  way  for 
new.  This  respect  for  the  serpent  tribe  led  to  their  being 
kept  as  pets.  Their  presence  was  considered  as  a  good  omen, 
and  they  were  allowed  to  play  about  the  persons  of  their  mas- 


ITALIAN  SIGHTS  AND  PAPAL  PRINCIPLES. 


1-99 


ters,  and  even  eat  from  the  cups  at  table.  The  ladies  per¬ 
mitted  them  to  coil  around  their  necks  in  hot  weather  as  a 
sort  of  animated  refrigerator.  They  repaid  this  hospitality 
by  keeping  under  other  vermin ;  but,  as  no  one  killed  them, 
they  increased  so  rapidly  as  to  become,  like  other  idols,  an  in¬ 
tolerable  nuisance.  Nothing  but  the  frequent  fires  of  antiq¬ 
uity  kept  them  within  bounds.  With  this  strange  fondness 
for  snakes  by  the  most  populous  nation  of  antiquity,  what  be¬ 
comes  of  our  cherished  idea  of  the  natural  enmity  between 
tlie  son  of  man  and  the  serpent  ? 

In  one  house  was  found  a  seated  figure  of  Jupiter,  with  the 
“  nimbus,”  or  glory,  encircling  his  head,  which  has  since  been 
borrowed  by  the  Romanists  for  their  crucifixes  .and  saints. 
His  figure  is  not  unlike  the  bronze  St.  Peter  at  Rome,  which 
enjoys  the  reputation  of  being  an  apostate  pagan  idol.  Two 
houses  possess  large  fountains,  quite  unique  in  their  charac¬ 
ter.  They  are  incrusted  with  colored  glass,  blue  being  the 
chief  hue,  and  divided  into  pretty  patterns  by  sea-shells,  which 
look  as  if  freshly  gathered.  The  ornaments  consist  chiefly 
of  aquatic  plants  or  birds  ;  but  the  effect  of  the  whole  is  more 
odd  than  pleasing. 

Notwithstanding  that  Pompeii  abounded  in  objects  of  luxu¬ 
ry,  the  shops  were  small  and  mean,  in  which  respect  they 
were  not  unlike  those  of  modern  Italian  cities.  The  front  was 
open  to  the  street,  with  the  exception  of  a  broad  counter  of 
stone.  The  open  space  Avas  closed  at  night  by  sliding  shut¬ 
ters.  Pompeii  was  celebrated  for  its  preparation  of  a  fish- 
pickle  called  garum,  made  of  the  entrails  of  mackerel  soaked  in 
brine.  The  best  sold  for  twenty  dollars  a  gallon.  The  cash 
system  in  general  prevailed,  if  we  may  believe  the  weights, 
which  were  sometimes  inscribed  “  erne” — pay  ;  and  on  others, 
“  You  shall  have  no  credit.”  Some  of  the  counters  still  bear 
the  traces  of  custom  in  the  stains  made  by  wet  glasses.  The 


200 


ITALIAN  SIGHTS  AND  PAPAL  PRINCIPLES. 


Romans  cooled  their  wines  in  snow,  and  also  boiled  them — a 
taste  which,  not  having  survived  their  nation,  was  a  medical 
caprice,  that,  like  “cod-liver  oil,”  lived  out  only  its  day,  and 
then  died.  Vomits  were  publicly  sold  as  preparations  to  din¬ 
ing  out,  the  quantity  as  well  as  the  quality  of  the  viands  to 
be  consumed  being  a  desideratum  of  Roman  epicures.  Cooked 
eggs,  bread  stamped  with  the  baker’s  name  and  its  quality, 
olives  in  oil  which  still  burned  well,  money  in  tills,  and  a 
vast  variety  of  manufactured  articles,  have  been  found  from 
year  to  year  ifi  the  shops.  In  some,  the  keepers  and  work¬ 
men  had  remained  behind  until  the  last  moment,  and  perhaps 
left  but  to  perish  a  little  farther  on.  In  one  place  we  see 
marble  partially  sculptured,  with  the  pattern  lying  by  the 
block  ;  in  another  shop,  the  resin  still  remained  in  the  pot 
where  it  had  been  recently  boiled,  and  the  sculptor’s  tools  were 
scattered  over  the  floor.  In  the  former  there  is  the  long,  slid¬ 
ing  mark  of  a  trowel  on  fresh  mortar,  as  if  the  workman  had 
just  given  the  outer  stroke,  and  had  fled  too  precipitately  to 
complete  the  inner,  which  brings  the  whole  to  a  level.  A 
house  connected  with  the  medical  faculty  yielded  more  than 
forty  surgical  instruments,  some  of  which,  in  modern  science, 
have  no  use,  while  others  are  almost  fac  similes  of  those  of  to¬ 
day.  I  saw  some  apparently  constructed  with  reference  to  the 
Caesarean  operation,  which  is  generally  supposed  to  be  the 
fruit  of  recent  surgery.  The  bakeries  are  so  little  injured  that 
the  corn-mills  and  ovens  could  be  put  into  use  again  at  once. 

Just  inside  the  Herculaneum  Gate  there  is  a  post-house  es¬ 
tablished  by  Augustus.  The  bones  of  horses  and  remains  of 
carriages  were  found  in  the  stables.  Outside  the  gate  is  the 
general  inn.  By  an  inhospitable  law,  the  only  ancient  munici¬ 
pal  regulation  which  the  King  of  Naples  still  enforces,  stran¬ 
gers  were  forbidden  to  sleep  within  the  city  limits.  The  re¬ 
mains  of  a  mother  and  four  children,  which  she  had  vainly  at- 


ITALIAN  SIGHTS  AND  PAPAL  PRINCIPLES. 


201 


tempted  to  shelter  from  the  fiery  shower,  were  found  in  the 
court-yard.  They  were  interlocked  in  mutual  embrace,  and, 
from  the  quantity  of  rich  jewelry,  including  pearl  pendants  of 
great  value,  found  with  them,  must  have  been  of  the  wealthier 
class. 

The  number  and  magnitude  of  public  buildings  in  so  small  a 
town  astonishes,  in  particular,  the  American  traveler,  who  sel¬ 
dom  finds  any  thing  worth  noticing  for  architectural  beauty  at 
home  in  cities  of  much  greater  extent  than  Pompeii.  But  the 
Roman  citizen  found  his  pleasures  abroad ;  his  home  was  in  pub¬ 
lic  ;  he  was  content  to  sleep  in  an  unfurnished  closet,  without 
other  aperture  than  the  door,  and  which  he  rarely  entered  except 
at  night,  provided  the  splendor  of  public  edifices  and  the  pro¬ 
fusion  of  public  amusements  compensated  him  for  his  domes¬ 
tic  deficiencies.  It  was,  therefore,  no  slight  penalty  that  Nero 
inflicted  upon  the  Pompeians  when  he  condemned  them  to  two 
years’  interdiction  of  gladiatorial  games  on  account  of  a  bloody 
fray  which  they  had  engaged  in  with  their  neighbors  of  Nu- 
ceria.  This  was  in  the  year  A.D.  59. 

There  are  two  theatres  in  good  preservation,  the  comic  and 
tragic,  capable  of  holding  about  eight  thousand  persons,  which 
is  a  large  proportion  out  of  a  town  of  ten  or  twelve  thousand 
souls.  The  performances  were  in  the  open  air,  there  being  no 
roof.  Formerly  the  Romans  stood.  The  state  was  considered 
in  danger  from  encroaching  effeminacy  when  seats  were  intro¬ 
duced  in  places  of  amusement.  A  greater  storm  of  ridicule 
and  sarcasm  accompanied  the  first  spreading  of  awnings  to 
protect  the  audiences  from  the  sun  than  did  the  first  raising 
of  umbrellas  in  the  days  of  James  1.  in  London,  so  reluctantly 
do  we  fall  into  even  new  comforts  when  opposed  by  old  prej¬ 
udices.  We  generally,  in  the  pride  of  our  Anglo-Saxon  civili¬ 
zation,  conceive  that  to  have  been  the  first  appearance  of  um¬ 
brellas  on  the  European  stage  ;  whereas  I  noticed  on  Grecian 


202 


ITALIAN  SIGHTS  AND  PAPAL  PRINCIPLES 


vases  more  than  twenty-five  hundred  years  old  very  well 
painted  parasols  and  umbrellas,  which  certainly  proves  their 
existence  in  Italy  as  early  as  the  foundation  of  Rome. 

The  seats  of  honor  were  near  the  stage.  Each  class  in¬ 
creased  its  distance  as  it  diminshed  in  rank,  until  the  plebeian 
crowd  filled  all  the  upper  rows  of  seats.  Behind  them,  in  the 
galleries,  were  placed  the  women,  and  near  them  the  police  ;  a 
regulation  which  gives  no  favorable  idea  of  the  gallantry  of  the 
male,  or  the  morals  of  the  fair  sex.  Two  of  the  chairs  used  by 
the  magistrates  of  the  theatres  have  been  found.  They  are  of 
bronze  inlaid  with  silver,  and  of  a  finish  so  beautiful  and  accu¬ 
rate  that  it  would  be  difficult  to  find  any  thing  in  modern  art 
to  surpass  them. 

Near  the  theatres  is  the  pretty  little  temple  of  Isis,  in  such 
good  preservation  as  to  be  a  tell-tale  of  the  mysteries  of  the 
Egyptian  Deity.  The  priests  were  dining  when  the  eruption 
took  place.  Several  died  beside  their  meal.  One  endeavored 
to  hew  his  way  with  an  axe  through  a  solid  stone  wall ;  an¬ 
other  perished  in  the  attempt  to  fly  with  treasure  snatched 
in  haste  from  the  shrine.  The  oracular  responses  of  the  idol 
all  find  their  clew  here,  so  it  is  generally  believed,  in  the  secret 
stairs  opening  behind  the  niche  for  the  statue,  which  gave  am¬ 
ple  space  for  a  concealed  priest  to  counterfeit  the  supposed 
voice  of  his  goddess.  But  there  was  no  more  priestly  jugglery 
in  this  pagan  temple  than  is  practiced  yearly  in  a  Christian 
church  in  Naples.  The  blood  of  St.  Januarius  is  as  much  a 
falsehood  as  was  the  voice  of  Isis.  Nor  do  I  believe  that  her 
priesthood  were,  in  general,  worse  in  morals  than  those  Ro¬ 
man  friars  who  have  continued  their  practices  under  anoth¬ 
er  name.  Both  devoted  themselves  to  celibacy  ;  both  shaved 
their  heads  ;  both  mortified  their  flesh  by  coarse  apparel,  bare 
feet,  and  fasting ;  and  both  pledged  themselves  to  pass  their 
vigils  in  devotion,  and  their  lives  in  chastity.  To  continue 


ITALIAN  SIGHTS  AND  PAPAL  PRINCIPLES. 

f 


203 


the  comparison,  both,  while  sincere  in  their  self-mortification, 
obtained  credit  and  power,  and  both  diminished  in  reputation 
as  hypocrisy  and  avarice  took  the  place  of  their  ostensible  vir¬ 
tues.  The  heathen  priest  was  the  parent  of  the  modern  monk. 

^  The  similarities  between  pagan  forms  and  Christian  rites  in 
Italy  prove  that,  with  the  common  religious  mind,  more  power 
lies  in  the  ceremony  than  in  the  confession.  Rites  that  have 
long  been  considered  as  necessary  for  salvation  are  slow  in 
dying  out,  though  reason  and  revelation  may  point  to  purer 
faiths  and  more  consistent  forms.  Were  a  Pompeian  to  awake 
in  Naples,  he  would  find  much  to  remind  him  of  his  old  belief ; 
altars,  images,  offerings,  and  lamps  in  the  public  streets,  as  he 
left  them  at  Pompeii,  constituting  a  shrine  at  every  conspicu¬ 
ous  corner.  The  sprinkling  of  holy  water,  the  fonts  in  the 
churches,  sacred  candelabra,  the  burning  of  incense,  display  of 
sacred  vessels,  and  the  contribution-box,  he  was  accustomed 
to  witness  in  his  own  temples.  These  would  create  no  more 
surprise  than  would  the  power  of  the  priesthood  and  pomp  of 
religious  processions.  The  multiplicity  of  sacred  images,  the 
numerous  altars,  a  queen  of  heaven,  with  an  apparent  plural¬ 
ity  of  gods,  would  remind  him  of  his  own  populous  mythology. 
In  short,  while  regretting  the  absence  of  his  favorite  games,  he 
would  doubtless  approve  the  disappearance  of  animal  sacrifice, 
and  consider  the  change  of  rites  from  the  exterior  of  a  noble 
temple,  in  the  sight  of  the  assembled  people,  to  the  interior  of 
a  gayly-decorated  church,  as  a  mere  matter  of  taste,  about 
which  it  was  not  worth  while  to  quarrel.  So  long  as  he  kept 
clear  of  doctrine,  he  would  probably  consider  that  the  religious 
world  was,  after  all,  not  much  out  of  its  old  track. 

Most  of  the  temples  are  upon  or  in  the  immediate  vicinity 
of  the  Civil  Forum,  which  was  the  central  point  of  business  and 
magnificence.  Here  are  the  triumphal  arches,  and  the  statues, 
or  rather  their  pedestals — for  the  statues  are  removed  to  Na- 


204 


ITALIAN  SIGHTS  AND  PAPAL  PRINCIPLES. 


pies — of  the  eminent  men  who  had  deserved  well  of  the  colo¬ 
ny.  The  stately  temple  of  Jupiter  occupies  its  northern  ex¬ 
tremity.  It  was  in  process  of  reparation  from  the  ravages  of 
the  earthquake  of  the  year  63  when  overwhelmed  in  the  de-i 
struction  of  79.  In  it  were  kept  the  public  archives.  Oppo¬ 
site  stands  the  Basilica,  or  Court  of  Justice,  with  its  subterra-j 
nean  prison.  On  either  side  are  numerous  public  buildings 
remarkable  for  their  beauty,  the  whole,  even  in  ruins,  forming 
a  rare  coup  d’mil  of  architectural  interest.  One  of  the  finest  of 
these  buildings  is  the  Chalcidicum,  built  by  the  priestess  Eu- 
machia,  at  her  own  expense,  as  a  washing-place  for  the  magis¬ 
terial  and  priestly  robes.  In  fact,  it  is  an  immense  shallow 
basin  of  the  purest  white  marble,  furnished  with  scouring- 
blocks  of  the  same  material  and  an  aqueduct  for  the  supply 
of  water,  constituting  probably  the  largest  and  most  beautiful 
wash-tub  in  existence.  The  position  chosen  for  an  edifice  of 
this  character,  in  the  centre  of  the  town,  is  singular,  but  its 
beauty  would  justify  an  even  more  conspicuous  locality.  It  is 
^  in  such  perfect  repair  that  it  could  give  scrubbing-room  to  a 
regiment  of  washwomen  without  other  delay  than  to  turn  on 
the  water.  A  portico,  supported  by  exquisitely  wrought  Co¬ 
rinthian  columns  of  Parian  marble,  surrounded  this  basin,  but 
the  columns  have  been  taken  away.  A  statue  of  Eumachia 
still  remains,  but  it  is  a  copy  of  the  original,  which  has  gone 
to  Naples.  On  the  same  side  of  the  Forum,  toward  the  north, 
stands  the  Pantheon,  as  the  building  is  called  which  was  ded¬ 
icated  to  the  big  gods,  the  aristocracy  of  Roman  mythology. 
The  twelve  pedestals  for  their  statues  still  remain,  but  the 
gods  have  departed  both  the  earth  and  faith  of  mankind. 
The  priesthood  that  waited  upon  them  must  have  been  a  jolly 
set,  judging  from  the  paintings  still  remaining  in  their  refec¬ 
tory,  which  are  in  every  way  provocative  of  gustatory  ideas. 
Indeed,  it  is  supposed  that  they  were  so  rich  and  hospitable 


ITALIAN  SIGHTS  AND  PAPAL  PRINCIPLES. 


205 


as  to  often  feast  their  fellow-citizens,  in  which  case  they  must 
have  been  the  most  popular  of  the  ancient  clergy.  Perhaps 
the  building  was,  notwithstanding  its  sacred  character,  but  a 
superior  kind  of  restaurant,  for  which  its  position  admirably 
adapted  it.  The  debris  of  many  dinners  was  found  in  a  sink 
in  its  court-yard,  which  shows  that  the  appetites  of  the  Pom¬ 
peians  held  good  to  the  last  moment. 

Passing  from  this  building,  I  entered  the  lawyers’  court 
by  deeply-worn  steps,  which  told  of  the  tread  of  many  busy 
feet  in  the  days  of  Cicero.  The  stiff  marble  pulpit,  from 
which  so  much  eloquence  and  chicanery  had  issued,  and  be¬ 
fore  which  had  stood  so  many  beating  hearts,  pulsating  with 
selfish  or  generous  interests,  as  the  orator  touched  the  human 
chords  of  wrong  or  right,  wore  an  impressive  stillness.  Not 
even  the  hum  of  an  insect  disturbed  the  intense  solitude  of 
that  sepulchre  of  law.  Silence  reigned  supreme.  In  the  in¬ 
tensity  of  the  sunlight  flashing  upon  the  upright  walls,  and 
clearness  of  atmosphere  over  head,  without  a  trace  around  or 
above  me  of  any  living  thing,  I  began  to  realize  the  idea  of 
the  “last  man.”  Lingering  but  for  an  instant  on  its  marble 
pavement,  I  turned  hastily  away  as  the  thought  intruded, 
“  What  would  all  my  fine  sentiment  be  worth,  supposing  this 
to  have  been  only  an  auctioneer’s  block?” 

A  Roman  town  without  a  public  bath  would  have  been  as 
strange  an  occurrence  as  a  Yankee  village  without  a  meeting¬ 
house.  So  long  a  time  had  elapsed  without  the  discovery  of 
any  building  of  this  character,  that  antiquarians  began  to  doubt 
whether  Pompeii,  after  all,  had  not  contained  an  unwashed 
population,  though  the  private  baths,  the  River  Sarno,  and  the 
sea  which  bathed  its  walls,  were  quite  suflicient  to  have  kept 
all  Campania  clean.  In  1824,  however,  the  present  baths 
were  opened.  Though  of  a  pigmy  extent  compared  with  the 
immense  establishments  of  Rome,  which  were  cities  within 


206 


ITALIAN  SIGHTS  AND  PAPAL  PRINCIPLES. 


themselves,  yet  they  are  vastly  superior,  both  in  size  and  dec¬ 
oration,  to  any  of  modern  times.  No  considerations  of  mod¬ 
esty  appear  to  have  interfered  with  a  Roman’s  enjoyment  of 
promiscuous  bathing.  To  bathe  was  a  primary  necessity — to 
bathe  in  public  was  an  enjoyment  equivalent  to  the  Opera  of 
modern  civilization.  At  first  men  and  women  bathed  togeth¬ 
er,  or  their  baths  were  united.  But  even  Roman  license 
became  scandalized  at  the  results,  and  the  sexes  were  sepa¬ 
rated.  Emperors  mingled  freely  in  the  baths  with  the  com¬ 
monest  citizens. 

It  is  said  of  Hadrian,  that  one  day,  seeing  a  veteran  soldier 
rubbing  his  body  against  the  marble  for  friction,  he  asked 
him  why  he  did  not  employ  the  slaves.  The  soldier  replied 
that  he  was  too  poor.  The  Emperor  immediately  presented 
him  with  two  slaves  and  a  sum  sufficient  to  maintain  them. 
A  few  days  after,  several  old  men,  who  had  witnessed  the  for¬ 
tune  of  their  companion,  attempted  to  attract  the  Emperor’s 
notice  by  using  the  marble  pilasters  in  lieu  of  crash  towels. 
He,  perceiving  their  drift,  quickly  set  them  at  work  rubbing 
each  other. 

The  bathers  were  usually  scraped  with  bronze  instruments 
called  strigiles,  much  after  the  fashion  of  currying  horses. 
This  was  a  rough  operation,  as  the  Emperor  Augustus  once 
discovered  to  his  cost.  Previous  to  bathing,  the  body  was 
anointed  with  oil,  and  upon  coming  out  of  the  bath,  costly  and 
delicate  perfumes  were  lavishly  used.  To  describe  the  entire 
operation  of  a  complete  bath  of  a  Roman  exquisite  would  re¬ 
quire  a  volume.  Every  luxury  of  art  was  employed  to  gratify 
the  taste,  and  every  means  which  a  sensuous  race  could  invent 
was  used  to  heighten  physical  pleasure.  The  resources  of  a 
more  than  Oriental  effeminacy  or  barbarian  energy  were  al¬ 
ternately  exhausted  to  stimulate  the  system  to  novel  emotions 
of  languid  or  active  enjoyment,  until  at  last  the  Roman  bath, 


ITALIAN  SIGHTS  AND  PAPAL  PRINCIPLES. 


207 


with  its  libraries,  gymnasiums,  lecture  and  reading  rooms,  its 
museums  of  art,  its  imperial  magnificence  and  prodigality  of 
sensual  attractions,  became  the  focus  and  the  grave  of  Roman 
life. 

The  Pompeian  baths  were  sufficiently  luxurious  in  their 
way,  and  are  in  such  excellent  preservation  that  they  might 
be  used  to  give  the  traveler  not  only  the  idea,  but  the  fact  of 
a  classical  ablution.  It  would  be  something  to  be  able  to  say 
that  one  had  hung  up  his  clothes  on  the  same  peg  which  had 
held  Pliny’s,  or  rubbed  his  sides  in  the  same  marble  tub  which 
had  held  one  of  the  family  of  Cicero.  That  they  visited  Pom¬ 
peii,  and  of  course  the  baths,  is  evident  from  an  inscription 
on  the  architrave  of  the  temple  of  Fortune,  which  says  that 
“  Marcus  Tullius  Cicero,  son  of  Marcus,  erected,  at  his  own  pri¬ 
vate  expense,  this  temple  to  Fortuna  Augusta.”  This  temple 
held  a  statue  of  Cicero,  with  a  purple-colored  toga.  The  prac¬ 
tice  of  gilding  and  coloring  statuary  was  not  uncommon  to  an¬ 
cient  sculptors,  and  in  some  cases  may  have  been  used  with 
good  effect.  The  English  sculptor  Gibson  has  sought  to  re¬ 
vive  this  fashion.  The  result  is,  that  his  experiments  have 
succeeded  in  giving  a  waxen  look  to  marble.  The  more  se¬ 
vere  rule  of  modern  art  is,  that  sculpture  is  the  legitimate  prov¬ 
ince  of  form,  and  not  of  color. 

On  the  wall  of  the  court  of  the  baths  is  the  following  in¬ 
scription  :  “  On  occasion  of  the  dedication  of  the  baths,  at  the 
expense  of  CnfEus  Alleius  !Nigidius  Maius,  there  will  be  the 
chase  of  wild  beasts,  athletic  contests,  sprinkling  of  perfumes, 
and  an  awning.  Prosperity  to  Maius,  chief  of  the  colony.” 

The  principal  divisions  of  the  interior  are  as  follows.  The 
Tepidarium,  or  warm  chamber,  a  large  oblong  hall,  with  an 
arched  ceiling,  beautifully  ornamented  with  bassi-relievi  in 
stucco.  Along  the  sides  beneath,  and  supporting  a  rich  cor¬ 
nice,  are  a  range  of  niches,  divided  by  sculptured  Telamones, 


208 


ITALIAN  SIGHTS  AND  PAPAL  PRINCIPLES 


or  male  figures  two  feet  high,  flesh-eolored,  and  with  black 
hair.  The  baskets  upon  their  heads  and  moulding  above  were 
gilt.  This  room  is  lighted  by  a  window  two  feet  and  a  half 
by  three,  formerly  closed  by  movable  panes  of  glass  in  a 


ITALIAN  SIGHTS  AND  PAPAL  PRINCIPLES. 


209 


bronze  frame.  Some  of  these  panes  were  found  perfect.  In 
it  still  remains  a  beautiful  bronze  brazier,  seven  feet  long  by 
two  and  a  half  wide,  used  for  heating  the  apartment.  The 
Calidarium,  or  hot  chamber,  contains  a  spacious  marble  bath¬ 
ing-tub  raised  on  a  pedestal  of  the  same  material.  The  walls 
are  lined  with  hot  air  and  steam  flues.  A  beautiful  marble 
basin,  five  feet  in  diameter,  containing  a  fountain  for  boiling 
water,  occupies  a  niche  at  the  lower  end  of  this  apartment. 
The  Frigidarium,  or  undressing  room,  is  circular,  with  a  dome 
roof,  in  which  is  a  window  two  feet  eight  inches  high,  and 
three  feet  eight  inches  broad,  once  closed  by  a  single  pane  of 
ground  glass  two  fifths  of  an  inch  thick,  the  fragments  of 
which  lay  on  the  floor  when  the  room  was  first  opened.  This 
establishes  the  fact  that  the  ancients  not  only  had  glazed  win¬ 
dows,  but  manufactured  large  panes  of  glass.  It  contains  also 
a  spacious  circular  marble  bath.  There  are  few  spots  of  more 
interest  in  Pompeii  than  these  baths. 

The  amphitheatre  is  at  the  farther  end  of  the  unexplored 
part  of  the  town.  I  wandered  slowly  thither,  meeting  on  my 
way  two  beggars,  who,  unlike  their  fraternity  in  general,  had 
each  a  gift  of  his  own  to  exercise  besides  the  accustomed  whine 
and  promise  of  saintly  blessings.  The  first  was  lame,  or  pre¬ 
tended  to  be,  but,  starting  forth  from  behind  a  doorway,  he  be¬ 
gan  a  most  extraordinary  dance,  on  principles  of  his  own,  to 
the  tune  of  an  antique  pipe  which  he  played  himself.  He 
was  the  most  like  an  antique  faun  of  any  living  thing  I  had 
ever  seen,  and,  consequently,  was  in  keeping  with  the  scene. 
I  gave  him  something,  and  left  him  to  finish  his  performance 
in  solitude.  Ascending  to  the  upper  surface  of  Pompeii,  if  the 
soil  above  has  any  right  to  the  name  of  the  town  it  has  de¬ 
stroyed,  I  met  another,  a  regular  modern  interloper,  who  jump¬ 
ed  a  Jim  Crow  sort  of  a  hop  to  a  negro  melody,  which  he  seem¬ 
ed  to  consider  just  the  thing  for  a  stranger.  Shade  of  Hercu- 


210 


ITALIAN  SIGHTS  AND  PAPAL  PRINCIPLES. 


les,  what  a  profanation !  I  hurried  past  him  in  silence,  not 
even  bestowing  the  charity  of  a  look. 

Tread  lightly !  On  a  soil  like  this,  who  can  tell  what  lies 
beneath  1  The  careless  feet  may  rudely  press  upon  some  maid¬ 
en’s  breast,  and  crush  an  infant  form.  There  is  a  pleasure  in 
speculating  over  the  contents  of  a  mine  of  Art  which  the  search 
for  mere  gold  can  not  possess.  A  statue  over  which  we  un¬ 
consciously  walk  may  prove  a  “  nugget”  of  wealth  to  the  find¬ 
er,  even  if  soulless  to  its  beauties.  The  very  dust  beneath 
bears  sifting.  There  is  gold  to  reward  the  toil,  and  beauty  to 
instruct  the  world.  How  much  of  actual  treasure  remains 
earth-bound  in  Italy !  Not  many  leagues  from  Pompeii  lies 
buried  Alaric  and  the  plunder  of  Rome.  Gold  and  silver  keep 
well  in  the  grave.  The  treasure  men  lose  their  lives  to  win 
mocks  at  their  brief  triumphs,  and  lives  to  corrupt  successive 
generations.  The  spoils  of  Jerusalem’s  temple,  the  seven- 
branched  golden  candlestick,  for  nearly  fifteen  centuries,  with 
wealth  untold,  have  rested  quietly  in  the  sands  of  the  Tiber. 
Will  not  avarice  league  with  art  to  search  for  what  would  so 
well  reward  the  discovery?  Were  Italy  half  as  much  dug 
over  as  are  the  gold-fields  of  Australia,  the  product  would,  I 
believe,  astonish  even  California  success. 

I  reached  the  amphitheatre  and  mounted  its  walls.  It  is  a 
baby  amphitheatre  compared  with  the  Coliseum,  yet  nearly 
fifteen  thousand  spectators  could  find  room  within  its  circum¬ 
ference.  There  are  twenty-four  rows  of  stone  seats  and  two 
fine  corridors. 

The  extreme  length  is  four  hundred  and  thirty  feet,  and  the 
greatest  breadth  three  hundred  and  thirty-five,  the  form  being 
oval,  and  the  whole  in  fine  preservation,  with  the  exception  of 
the  frescoes  which  once  covered  the  passages,  and  the  finer 
portions  or  facings  of  stone- work.  I  have  a  passion  for  am¬ 
phitheatres,  but  it.  depends  upon  the  associations  connected 


ITALIAN  SIGHTS  AND  PAPAL  PRINCIPLES. 


211 


with  their  symmetry  and  strength.  This  upward  springing  of 
arch  upon  arch  heavenward,  in  strong  and  graceful  sweep,  re¬ 
ceding  gradually  from  the  arena,  but  mounting  directly  toward 
the  sky  on  the  exterior,  combines  a  grandeur  of  force  and  beau¬ 
ty  in  a  higher  degree  than  any  other  of  the  architectural  works 
of  man.  The  Pyramid  of  Cheops  is  indeed  stupendous,  but, 
after  all,  it  is  only  artificial  hulk  and  weight  in  its  simplest 
form.  The  Coliseum,  on  the  contrary,  is  a  noble  triumph  of 
art — an  expansion  of  science  and  strength  which  stamps  the 
character  of  a  nation  for  all  time.  It  is  Rome’s  proudest  med¬ 
al  to  her  architectural  genius.  Years  sufficed  to  build  it,  but 
centuries  of  devastation  have  been  unable  to  destroy  it.  I 
love,  then,  the  massive  walls  of  the  amphitheatres,  with  their 
beautiful  curves  and  lightly-poised  arches,  and  have  visited 
them  all — Rome,  Nismes,  Arles,  Verona,  Puteoli,  and  Pom¬ 
peii — with  unfailing  pleasure.  The  last  remains  most  in  keep¬ 
ing  with  its  original  design.  All  that  is  to  be  learned  of  their 
brutal  purposes  is  here  apparent — the  arena,  dens,  vomitories, 
and  passages  for  slain  brutes  or  men.  There  would  be  little 
need  of  restoration  should  the  taste  for  human  slaughter  to  af¬ 
ford  a  Roman  holiday  revive.  While  they  commemorate  the 
daring  genius  of  the  conquerors  of  the  world,  they  record  also 
their  brutalization  and  inhumanity.  Can,  however,  the  age 
that  tolerated  the  Inquisition  reproach  the  Romans  for  the 
Amphitheatre  ?  The  latter  disappeared  before  Christianity, 
though  not  until  Christian  blood  had  soaked  its  arena.  The 
former  sprang  from  so-called  Christianity,  and  martyred  its 
hecatombs,  in  slow  tortures,  in  the  name  of  a  merciful  Savior. 
We  need  to  recall  such  truths  to  teach  us  humility  when  we 
sit  in  judgment  upon  the  Past. 

The  performances  in  these  amphitheatres  of  a  milder  char¬ 
acter  stand  unrivaled  in  our  times.  Elephants  were  trained 
to  dance  on  a  tight  rope  with  towers  and  riders  on  their  back, 


213 


ITALIAN  SIGHTS  AND  PAPAL  PRINCIPLES. 


and  other  feats  equally  wonderful.  Their  jugglery  was  almost 
upon  a  par  with  Egyptian  miracles. 

The  extent  of  the  disaster  in  the  number  of  the  dead  was 
not  so  great  at  Pompeii  as  to  make  it  exceed  some  of  our  West¬ 
ern  steam-boat  explosions,  or  other  casualties  which  we  have 
so  ingeniously  contrived  for  sending  our  fellow-citizens  by 
scores,  without  warning,  into  eternity.  Here  the  warning  was 
ample.  Those  who  lingered  and  were  lost,  hut  a  few  hund¬ 
red  in  number,  judging  from  the  skeletons  as  yet  found,  were 
probably  the  aged  or  helpless,  the  thief  who  stopped  to  plun¬ 
der,  or  the  criminal  whose  bonds  prevented  his  escape.  Some 
doubtless  perished,  like  the  soldiers,  from  a  rigid  sense  of  duty 
or  discipline  ;  some  from  incredulity  as  to  the  reality  of  dan¬ 
ger  ;  and  others  from  those  instinctive  impulses  of  self-denial 
and  generosity  which  so  often,  in  the  hour  of  peril,  sanctify 
and  exalt  human  nature.  Selfishness  and  despair  there  were 
too,  in  their  most  despicable  and  brutal  forms,  and  philosoph¬ 
ical  curiosity,  which,  like  Pliny’s  the  elder,  in  seeking  to  re¬ 
lieve,  sought  also  to  investigate,  even  at  the  expense  of  his  own 
existence.  Other  great  calamities,  which  form  epochs,  as  it 
were,  in  the  successive  miseries  of  the  human  race,  become 
fainter  and  fainter  as  they  recede  in  the  vista  of  time,  till  their 
interest  concentrates  in  a  brief  historical  paragraph,  which  in¬ 
structs  us,  but  does  not  move.  Pompeii,  on  the  contrary,  is  a 
perpetual  reminiscence  of  the  actual  fears,  struggles,  and  hor¬ 
ror  which  attended  its  final  doom.  The  hopelessness  and  ter¬ 
rific  grandeur  of  the  morning  of  the  24th  of  August,  A.D.  79, 
with  all  its  agonies,  crimes,  and  virtues,  is  touchingly  before 
us.  We  see  the  deserted  house,  the  forsaken  temple,  the 
coveted  treasure,  the  jewel  spared  during  eighteen  centuries 
of  death  to  its  fair  owner,  the  paintings,  gifts  of  friendship  and 
tokens  of  taste,  and  all  the  evidences  of  a  domestic  life  as 
dearly  prized  as  our  own,  left  as  if  the  owner  had  but  stepped 


ITALIAN  SIGHTS  AND  PAPAL  PRINCIPLES. 


213 


out  to  see  a  neighbor ;  shops  filled  with  merchandise,  but 
empty  of  customers ;  the  labor  of  the  mechanic  interrupted, 
and  destined  never  to  receive  the  finishing  stroke  ;  kitchens 
that  are  tell-tales  of  domestic  economy  and  luxurious  extrava¬ 
gance  ;  the  narrow,  tomb-like  cells  assigned  to  slaves,  bespeak¬ 
ing  a  servitude  worse  than  the  modern  African  ;  in  short,  ev¬ 
ery  thing  that  goes  to  make  up  active  human  existence,  even 
to  the  forms  of  manhood,  beauty,  and  infancy,  impressed  upon 
the  solid  lava,  disclosing  the  very  features  worn  until  the  last 
hour  of  life — all  these,  and  more,  which  Pompeii  has  yielded 
up  to  the  present  generation,  bring  vividly  back  to  the  heart 
the  hour  and  story  of  her  fiery  burial. 

Retracing  my  steps  through  the  modern  farm,  I  strolled 
once  more  along  the  street  of  tombs  which  led  in  the  direction 
of  Herculaneum.  The  old  city  of  the  dead  was  but  a  contin¬ 
uation  of  the  old  city  of  the  living ;  there  was  not  even  a  di¬ 
viding  line  ;  sepulchre  and  domestic  roof  are  intermingled. 
This  familiarity  with  death  was  common  among  the  Romans. 
They  entered  or  left  their  paternal  cities  through  long  lines  of 
ancestral  monuments,  reminding  them  of  glories  won  and 
honors  conferred  by  past  generations,  which  in  time  might 
also  become  their  own.  These  tombs  are  no  vulgar  graves, 
but  have  a  cheerful  look  of  elegance,  as  if  intended  more  to 
please  the  eye  of  the  living  than  to  secure  the  dead.  Indeed, 
the  Romans  could  have  had  none  of  the  unpleasant  ideas 
which  moderns  have  in  connection  with  the  bodies  of  the  de¬ 
parted.  They  feared  no  grave-yard  odors  or  fearful  sights  of 
mouldering  humanity,  for  the  simple  process  of  burning  corpses 
secured  them  equally  against  contagion  and  repulsive  associa¬ 
tions.  The  funerals  took  place  at  night,  with  great  pomp  and 
the  burning  of  torches.  This  practice,  in  all  its  essential  par¬ 
ticulars,  is  still  continued  at  Rome,  the  body,  richly  dressed 
and  covered  with  flowers,  being  borne  on  an  open  litter 


214 


ITALIAN  SIGHTS  AND  PAPAL  PRINCIPLES. 


through  the  streets.  The  modern  phrase,  to  receive  the  dy¬ 
ing  breath,  is  become  a  poetical  expression  of  attendance  on 
the  dying ;  but  among  the  Romans  it  had  a  practical  signifi¬ 
cation.  The  nearest  relative  bent  over  the  body  of  the  dying 
person  to  inhale  his  latest  breath,  fondly  thinking  that  the 
principle  of  life  left  the  body  at  that  instant  by  the  mouth. 

The  ashes  of  the  dead,  being  deposited  in  urns,  were  placed 
in  niches  in  tombs,  which,  from  their  resemblance  to  the  ar¬ 
rangement  of  dove-cotes,  were  called  columbaria.  The  Ro¬ 
mans  literally  laid  away  their  ancestors  on  the  shelf.  This 
was  also  an  economical  practice,  for  one  tomb  could  contain  a 
great  number  of  urns. 

From  the  tombs  I  ascended  the  ancient  walls  to  look  down 
upon  the  city.  In  the  rear  of  the  House  of  the  Yestals  there 
is  a  high  tower  in  fine  preservation.  Passing  from  the  wall 
into  this,  I  mounted  to  the  top  to  enjoy  the  landscape.  Un¬ 
roofed  Pompeii,  with  its  marble  columns  and  spacious  court¬ 
yards,  lay  glittering  in  the  sunlight  beneath  me.  If  it  looked 
lovely  then,  what  must  it  have  appeared  when  its  streets 
were  a  crowded  mart,  its  port  filled  with  Oriental  ships,  and  its 
public  and  private  houses  were  robed  in  Tyrian  purple  and 
glittering  with  gold  ?  The  sea  was  as  tranquil  as  in  the  morn¬ 
ing,  with  its  white  sails  drowsily  hanging  over  its  surface.  It 
glittered  in  the  sinking  sun  as  if  a  diamond  sheet  had  been 
dropped  from  the  Celestial  City.  On  the  farther  horizon  lay 
Ischia  and  the  headlands  of  that  noble  bay,  reposing  tranquil¬ 
ly  on  the  water  like  floating  Edens.  To  the  right  was  Naples 
^and  the  intervening  towns,  with  their  white  walls,  inclosing 
the  landscape  as  a  setting  of  pearls.  Over  against  me,  in 
dark  shadow,  was  the  ancient  Mons  Lactarius,  with  snow  still 
lingering  in  its  northern  crevices.  At  its  base  lies  subterra¬ 
nean  Stabise,  with  its  rich  villas,  a  Roman  Brighton,  buried 
under  the  same  shower  as  Pompeii.  Modern  Castellamare 


ITALIAN  SIGHTS  AND  PAPAL  PRINCIPLES. 


215 


has  grown  upon  its  site  and  succeeded  to  its  reputation  as  a 
watering-place.  A  broad  and  fertile  plain,  barely  moistened 
by  the  shrunken  Sarno,  unites  Pompeii  with  Castellamare. 
In  my  rear,  Vesuvius  gradually  swelled  up  from  the  city  walls, 
with  mingled  fertility  and  sterility,  as  the  lava-streams  had 
spared  or  buried  its  cultivated  base.  The  clear  setting  sun¬ 
light  sent  its  illuminating  rays  into  its  inmost  gorges,  bringing 
them,  as  it  were,  close  to  me,  and  revealing  every  secret  char- 
aclfer.  Above  all,  the  diadem  of  that  beauteous  landscape, 
brilliant  with  borrowed  glory,  rose  the  crater  summit,  abrupt 
and  cragged,  but  as  powerful  as  a  mountain  of  granite.  A 
light,  fleecy  vapor  curled  gently  from  its  mouth,  and  melted 
away  lazily  like  the  smoke  of  an  aristocratic  cigar.  The  en¬ 
tire  view  formed  a  panorama  on  which  one  could  not  gaze  his 
fill. 

My  eyes  ranged  rapidly  from  one  object  to  another,  but  at 
last  became  fixed  on  the  cone  of  Vesuvius.  The  light,  fleecy 
vapor  was  succeeded  by  rich  masses  of  pure  white  cloud. 
These  were  pufi'ed  fast  and  furiously  from  the  crater,  like 
escaping  volumes  of  high-pressure  steam.  They  gradually 
disappeared  before  a  light  breeze  which  had  begun  to  stir,  but 
before  they  were  wholly  gone,  a  dense  smoke,  of  inky  black¬ 
ness,  arose  from  a  somew'hat  nearer  point  of  view,  and  mount¬ 
ed  with  great  rapidity  into  the  sky.  It  soon  reached  an  ele¬ 
vation  of,  I  should  judge,  nine  thousand  feet,  or  three  times 
the  height  of  Vesuvius  ;  then  bending,  as  it  were,  beneath  its 
own  weight,  it  flattened  out  at  the  top  like  a  spread  umbrella 
or  the  branches  of  an  Italian  pine,  and  cast  a  deep  shadow 
upon  the  mountain  beneath  it.  There  were  bright  spots  to 
be  seen  through  its  gloom,  not  star-like,  but  lurid.  I  could 
compare  it  to  nothing  but  to  the  tree  of  evil,  with  its  in¬ 
fernal  fruit  shot  up  from  hell,  as  an  omen  of  coming  woe  to 
men.  Pluto  was  preparing  to  visit  the  earth  amid  wonders 


216 


ITALIAN  SIGHTS  AND  PAPAL  PRINCIPLES. 


and  ruin.  This  strange  apparition  slowly  sunk  again  into  the 
crater. 

I  had  been  so  occupied  with  the  mountain  that  I  had  quite 
forgotten  to  look  toward  the  city.  Turning,  however,  as  the 
cloud  gradually  subsided,  I  saw  the  inhabitants  gazing  in  awe 
and  perplexity  upon  the  phenomenon.  While  they  looked, 
lightnings  began  to  play  through  the  sky.  There  was  no  thun¬ 
der,  though  their  flashes  were  so  intense  as  to  be  clearly  seen 
in  the  bright  sunlight.  The  colossal  statue  of  Jupiter,  front¬ 
ing  his  temple  on  the  Forum,  was  shivered  to  pieces,  and  one 
of  the  Augustals,  passing  at  the  time,  was  crushed  to  death  be¬ 
neath  the  falling  fragments.  A  cry  of  horror  reached  my  ears. 
By  an  instinctive  impulse,  each  citizen  seemed  to  accept  the 
omen  as  the  death-warning  to  their  town  and  race. 

The  stillness  that  succeeded  to  the  cloud  and  lightnings  was 
awful.  The  leaves  of  the  trees  were  as  still  as  if  carved  in 
marble.  To  me  it  appeared  as  if  all  nature  was  holding  its 
breath  in  terror  of  coming  annihilation.  The  very  air  seemed 
extinct,  and  all  life,  anticipating  its  doom,  lay  spell-bound  in 
silence.  The  feeling  of  passive  horror  was  too  intense  to  last 
long.  Action,  although  no  one  knew  what  to  do  or  where  to 
fly,  became  a  relief.  The  wild  animals  in  their  cages  at  the 
amphitheatre  alternately  moaned,  and  sulked,  and  flew  into 
paroxysms  of  fierceness.  Their  instincts  foreboded  strange 
dangers,  and  their  captivity  turned  their  fear  into  rage;  but 
their  keepers  were  too  much  interested  in  consulting  their  own 
safety  to  think  of  the  brutes  in  their  charge.  Already  had  the 
amphitheatre  been  cleared  of  its  spectators,  who  had  come  up 
from  Noceria,  StabiaB,  and  even  Herculaneum,  to  witness  the 
games.  They  now  hurried  toward  their  homes  with  a  feeling 
that  Pompeii  was  fated  to  destruction. 

Many  of  the  inhabitants,  believing  that  a  recurrence  of  earth¬ 
quakes,  such  as  desolated  Campania  twelve  years  before,  was 


ITALIAN  SIGHTS  AND  PAPAL  PRINCIPLES. 


217 


about  to  take  place,  sought  security  in  precipitate  flight.  Some 
took  to  the  shipping,  and,  putting  off  at  once,  escaped.  Others 
tried  their  chariots  ;  but  the  earth  now  began  to  move  to  and 
fro,  and  even  up  and  down,  like  the  waves  of  the  sea,  so  that 
the  horses  were  either  thrown  down  or  paralyzed  with  fright. 
To  increase  the  confusion,  intense  darkness  obscured  every 
thing.  Pompeii  and  the  whole  country  became  like  a  closet 
shut  against  all  light.  No  one  knew  which  way  to  turn.  The 
cries  and  struggles  were  terrible  to  hear ;  lost  children  were 
calling  upon  fond  parents  who  were  unable  to  help.  The 
weak  were  overthrown.  Women  vainly  implored  the  assist¬ 
ance  of  men.  Despair  at  last  kept  the  multitude  still,  for  to 
move  was  almost  certain  destruction. 

A  fiery  light  suddenly  glared  over  the  strange  spectacle, 
bmake-like  flashes  darted  here  and  there,  imparting  a  lurid 
glare  to  the  woe-struck  human  countenances  and  marble  walls. 

I  felt  there  was  immediate  danger  for  me  to  remain  where  I 
was,  but  I  was  rooted  to  the  spot  by  the  terrible  fascination 
of  the  scene.  ^  et  all  that  I  had  beheld  was  as  nothino*  com- 
pared  with  what  followed 

The  flashes  of  light  ceased  to  play  about  the  top  of  the 
mountain.  Instantly  a  mighty  crash  was  heard,  as  if  the 
mountain  had  split  in  twain.  The  very  sea  roared  with  pain. 
Heavy  thunderings  muttered  and  rolled  deep  in  the  bowels  of 
earth,  and,  passing  up,  burst  into  the  air  with  the  noise  of  an 
exploded  world.  The  mountain  was  indeed  rent  in  twain. 
Every  building  in  the  city  trembled  to  its  foundations  ;  walls 
were  split,  and  statues  overthrown  by  the  concussion.  The 
tower  where  I  was  for  a  few  seconds  reeled  like  a  drunken 
man,  but  settled  again  on  its  base  without  much  damage. 
High  into  the  air,  higher  even  than  the  cloud-tree  rose,  shot 
up  burning  stones,  flames,  and  ashes  all  fire,  a  terrific  shower 
of  destruction.  Some  of  the  stones  were  immense  masses  of 

K 


gl8  ITALIAN  SIGHTS  AND  PAPAL  PRINCIPLES. 


red-hot  rock,  which,  striking  against  each  other  in  their  rapid 
ascent,  hurst  into  myriads  of  pieces,  scattering  fire  and  light  in 
all  directions.  Fortunately,  in  falling,  they  did  not  reach  the 
city. 

A  new  and  even  more  horrible  enemy  had  appeared  at  the 
same  time,  hut  which,  so  taken  up  was  I  with  the  grandeur  of 
the  exploding  masses  of  stone,  I  had  not  immediately  noticed. 
Through  the  rent  in  the  mountain  a  stream  of  viscid,  red-hot 
liquid  rock  flowed  steadily  out,  rapidly  making  its  way  toward 
the  sea,  enlarging  in  depth  and  breadth  at  every  foot  of  its 
progress.  This,  then,  was  the  real  demon  of  destruction  to 
which  the  mountain  had  given  birth.  It  swept  every  living 
thing  before  it.  Forests,  and  even  hills,  melted  at  its  touch, 
swelling  the  fiery  flood,  and  disappearing  slowly  beneath  it 
with  a  sullen  plunge,  amid  violent  explosions  and  dense  smoke. 
Valleys  filled  up  j  large  rocks  were  floated  for  a  considera¬ 
ble  distance  in  this  strange  river  like  cork  on  water,  tossing 
and  splashing  about  in  fiery  spray  before  they  became  lava 
themselves.  Some  sank,  and  were  thrown  high  into  the  air 
again,  forming  as  they  fell  thick,  blood-red  whirlpools,  which 
boiled  and  bubbled  with  a  fierce  sluggishness,  uttering  the 
while  strange  bellowings  and  mutterings,  as  if  the  elements 
of  nature  were  engaged  in  mortal  conflict.  The  light  from 
this  lava-stream  shed  a  ghastly  glow  over  the  entire  country. 
It  soon  reac]|jed  the  cultivated  grounds,  and  farms  and  villages 
were  speedily  in  flames.  I  watched  its  course  until  it  struck 
that  shady  knoll  where  I  had  so  often  passed  the  sultry  sum¬ 
mer  hours  with  my  friend  Plautus  in  his  charming  villa,  which 
in  an  instant  was  a  mass  of  smoking  ruins.  The  stream  now 
turned  from  the  direction  of  Pompeii  and  moved  toward  Het- 
culaneum. 

Although  this  danger  was  averted  from  PompSii,  another  no 
less  destruetive  succeeded,  warning  the  remaining  inhabitants 


ITAIJAN  SIGHTS  AND  PAPAL  PRINCIPLES. 


219 


to  abandon  their  homes,  which  no  longer  afforded  them  shelter. 
From  my  elevated  position  I  could  see  all  that  occurred,  and 
was  near  enough  to  hear  at  times  the  voices  of  the  multitude 
and  recognize  my  friends.  Showers  of  hot  ashes,  cinders,  and 
even  large  stones  began  to  fall,  obscuring  the  remaining  light, 
and  making  the  sun  appear  as  if  under  an  eclipse.  The  peo¬ 
ple  retreated  to  the  public  porticoes,  but  the  burning  ashes 
were  so  fine  that  they  penetrated  into  the  inmost  chamber, 
and  drove  out  all  who,  until  that  moment,  had  fancied  that 
strong  walls  could  protect  them.  I  had  noticed  that  Diomedes 
had  invited  many  of  his  friends  to  take  refuge  in  the  cellar  of 
his  villa,  which  early  in  the  day  he  had  stored  with  provis¬ 
ions,  believing  that  its  massive  walls  and  half-subterranean 
position  would  be  proof  against  the  volcanic  storm.  As  the 
ashes  began  to  penetrate  the  narrow  apertures,  the  male  por¬ 
tion  left  and  made  a  desperate  effort  to  reach  the  sea.  A  few 
succeeded,  but  Diomedes  and  a  servant,  bearing  such  treasures 
as  he  had  hastily  snatched  up,  were  struck  down  by  a  shower 
of  stones,  and  must  have  soon  perished.  I  could  hear  Dio- 
medes’s  cries^  to  the  last,  offering  his  entire  wealth  to  any  one 
who  would  aid  him  to  escape  The  poor  women  and  children 
left  in  the  cellar  could  not  have  long  survived,  as  its  position 
exposed  it  to  the  first  effects  of  the  terrible  lava-hail,  which 
was  now  accompanied  at  intervals  by  showers  of  boiling  water 
and  sulphurous  masses  of  vapor,  that  struck  with  immediate 
death  every  living  thing  that  inhaled  it.  I  had  some  time  be¬ 
fore  retreated  to  a  chamber  of  the  tower,  which  still  afibrded 
me  a  good  view  and  protected  me  from  the  immediate  efiects 
of  the  eruption. 

The  showers  of  boiling  water,  fall  of  burning  stones,  ava¬ 
lanche  of  ashes,  and  jets  of  mephitic  gases  completed  the  cli¬ 
max  of  evils  upon  the  doomed  city.  Those  of  the  inhabit¬ 
ants  that  had  sufl^icient  strength  no  longer  looked  for  shelter 


220- 


ITALIAN  SIGHTS  PAPAL  PRINCIPLES. 


from  massive  walls,  but  rushed  into  the  streets  with  pillows, 
domestic  utensils,  and  even  tables  tied  upon  their  heads,  to 
protect  them  from  the  falling  masses,  and  made  for  the  port, 
where  there  still  remained  some  vessels.  But  the  sea  was 
terribly  agitated.  It  ebbed  and  flowed  with  great  rapidity 
every  few  minutes,  leaving  the  fish  stranded  upon  the  shores, 
or  sweeping  them  up  into  the  streets.  There  was  now  no 
more  hope  of  safety  on  the  water  than  on  the  land.  The  dark¬ 
ness  also  increased.  ^>ome  of  the  magistrates  ordered  torches 
to  be  placed  in  the  public  way.  This  afforded  some  relief  to 
the  hopeless  confusion  of  the  flying,  but  individual  panic  had 
now  assumed  too  violent  a  stage  to  be  regardful  of  the  public 
good.  The  worst  passions  and  most  selfish  instincts  of  human 
nature  had  come  into  full  play.  Blasphemous  wretches  and 
hardened  criminals,  availing  themselves  of  the  chaos  of  all 
order,  plundered  the  shrines  of  the  gods,  robbed  the  public 
treasuries,  and  penetrated  into  private  houses,  snatching  up 
the  deserted  wealth,  and  stabbing  the  impotent  owners  who 
attempted  to  resist.  The  falling  fire  had  set  many  of  the 
wooden  roofs  into  a  blaze,  so  that  Pompeii  was  thus  threaten¬ 
ed  with  a  double  conflagration.  The  plunder  of  the  villains  in 
many  cases  was  the  cause  of  their  death,  for,  burdened  by  its 
weight,  they  but  the  more  speedily  met  the  fate  which  was 
due  to  their  crimes.  Slaves,  too,  who  had  long  concealed  the 
hatred  which  their  cruel  treatment  inspired,  turned  upon  their 
effeminate  masters,  mocked  their  tears  and  appeals  for  aid,  or 
slew  them  pitilessly  before  the  eyes  of  their  wives  and  chil¬ 
dren,  whom  they  at  length  abandoned  to  more  lingering  deaths. 
I  saw  the  rich  widow  Julia,  as  she  rose  from  the  luxurious 
breakfast-table  of  Sallust,  aided  by  her  gallant  host,  attempt 
to  escape  by  the  Herculaneum  gate.  With  her  children  she 
reached  the  portico  of  the  inn,  and  there,  fainting  from  fear  and 
unwonted  effort,  clasped  her  offspring  in  her  arms  and  calmly 


ITALIAN  SIGHTS  AND  PAPAL  PRINCIPLES. 


221 


sat  down  to  die.  Sallust  in  vain  attempted  to  rouse  her  to 
farther  exertion.  A  shower  of  burning  cinders,  more  heavy 
than  common,  drove  him  to  flight,  and  buried  the  hapless  fam¬ 
ily  in  their  living  grave.  The  shrieks  of  the  poor  children 
were  appalling.  But,  in  the  general  terror,  who  could  stop  to 
pity  individual  torture  ? 

The  iEdile  Pansa  behaved  nobly.  He  assembled  some  of 
the  centurions  and  their  soldiers,  and  inspired  them  with  firm¬ 
ness  to  act  for  the  general  good.  Never  was  the  power  of 
Roman  discipline  more  heroically  vindicated.  To  the  latest 
moment  the  sentinels  were  changed  ;  the  relieved  returned  to 
die  in  their  barracks — those  on  duty,  at  their  posts.  Patrols 
sternly  marched  through  the  city,  arresting  and  summarily 
punishing  the  vagabonds  who  were  adding  crime  to  the  uni¬ 
versal  distress.  But  what  could  a  few  self-devoted  soldiers 
hope  to  do  against  the  powers  of  darkness,  leagued  together 
for  the  destruction  of  humanity  ?  So  long  as  there  remained 
a  voice  to  command  them,  they  obeyed  ;  when  this  ceased, 
they  too  sought  safety  in  flight,  but  with  most  it  was  too  late. 

The  struggles  of  the  flying  mass  were  frightful.  Parents 
fled  from  their  children ;  children  deserted  their  parents ; 
beauty  appealed  in  vain  to  strength  for  aid.  Safety,  safety 
was  the  universal  thought.  Numbers  fell  and  were  trampled 
upon  by  the  advancing  crowd  ;  before  they  could  rise  again, 
the  hot  ashes  and  cinders  had  buried  them  forever,  and  their 
lifeless  forms  were  trodden  into  shapeless  masses  by  flying 
neighbors  and  kindred.  Yet,  amid  all  this  utter  selfishness 
of  despair,  there  flashed  out  bright  examples  of  generous  de¬ 
votion  that  reconciled  one  to  human  nature,  and  proved  that, 
even  in  its  darkest  moments,  it  was  instinctive  with  noble¬ 
ness  and  truth.  I  saw  the  slave  shelter  his  master’s  child  in 
his  brawny  arms  at  the  expense  of  his  own  excoriated  back, 
bared  to  the  falling  water  and  ashes.  He  reached  a  boat  in 


222 


ITALIAN  SIGHTS  AND  PAPAL  PRINCIPLES. 


safety  and  put  off  on  the  water.  A  young  woman  led  out  an 
aged  blind  man,  perhaps  her  father,  and  piloted  him  a  while 
slowly  but  surely  through  the  encumbered  streets.  I  soon 
lost  sight  of  them.  Other  examples  there  were  of  tenderness 
and  fidelity  ;  but  who  could  watch  individual  progress  to  the 
end  in  such  a  scene  1  A  lion  had  escaped  from  the  amphithe¬ 
atre.  He  ran  howling  over  the  scorching  embers,  seeking 
companionship  with  men,  until  at  length,  unable  to  endure  the 
falling  cinders,  he  crept  into  a  deserted  shop,  and  there  laid  him¬ 
self  down  to  die.  But  the  strangest  spectacle  was  a  company 
of  Nazarenes,  who,  robed  in  white,  sought  not  to  escape  from 
the  city,  but  marched  in  procession  through  the  streets,  with 
torches  in  hand,  chanting  hymns  to  their  Deity,  and  proclaim¬ 
ing  in  doleful  voices  that  “  the  last  hour  of  man  was  come.” 

None  seemed  to  bestow  a  thought  upon  the  infirm  and  fee¬ 
ble,  but  left  them  to  perish.  Cries  of  anguish  and  despair  fre¬ 
quently  arose  amid  the  burning  buildings  from  these  deserted 
victims,  who  gazed  hopelessly  upon  their  approaching  fate. 
Fire  consumed  some ;  gases  suffocated  others  ;  many  were 
covered  with  the  fine  volcanic  dust  while  still  gasping  for 
breath,  or  were  crushed  by  falling  timbers.  Whichever  way 
I  turned  my  eyes,  new  horrors  appalled  them.  But  I  soon 
had  to  reflect  upon  my  own  position.  Could  I  escape  ?  I 
hurried  to  each  window  in  turn.  The  volcanic  shower  in¬ 
creased  in  fury  and  density.  Pompeii  already  lay  half  still  in 
death.  To  go  out  was  impossible — to  remain  was  death. 
How  I  cursed  my  fatal  curiosity !  I  ran  around  my  narrow 
chamber  like  a  madman.  The  hot  cinders  penetrated  by  the 
windows  and  fell  upon  my  flesh.  Heavens  !  how  they  slowly 
burned  into  my  body,  cooling  themselves  in  my  blood!  I 
choked  for  air.  Thirst  maddened  me.  Water,  water;  but 
one  drop  to  cool  the  fever  of  my  tongue !  I  screamed,  and 
fell  senseless  upon  the  floor. 


ITALIAN  SIGHTS  AND  PAPAL  PRINCIPLES. 


223 


At  this  moment  a  hand  touched  me,  and  I — awoke.  “Your 
Excellency  will  he  too  late  for  the  last  train  for  Naples  if  you 
slumber  longer  here,”  said  the  polite  guard.  I  slipped  a  coin 
into  his  hands,  thanked  him,  stood  a  moment  gazing  upon  dis¬ 
interred  Pompeii  and  the  quiet  volcano,  to  satisfy  myself  that, I 
after  all,  it  was  but  a  dream,  and,  hurrying  off  to  Naples,' 
speedily  forgot  my  late  sufferings  in  a  capital  dinner  at  the 
Cafe  de  I’Europe,  which  I  take  the  liberty  to  recommend  as 
worthy  of  its  name. 


CHAPTER  VIII. 


THE  PAPAL  COURT - THE  HOLY  WEEK  AT  ROME. 

The  Holy  Week  at  Rome  !  What  unholy  reminiscences  of 
crowding,  struggling,  contention  ;  of  extortion  and  cheating ; 
of  dirt  and  discomfort ;  in  short,  of  all  the  ills  attendant  upon 
the  multiplication  of  the  population  of  the  Holy  City  tenfold  in 
proportion  to  its  capacity  of  accommodation,  does  not  this  sol¬ 
emn  Church-festival  vividly  recall  to  every  traveler  who  has 
undergone  its  purgatorial  experience,  either  to  view  its  vain 
show,  or  to  stir  anew  languid  devotion  in  witnessing  the  sig¬ 
nificant  facts  in  man’s  redemption  which  it  is  intended  to  com¬ 
memorate  ?  Rome,  during  this  period,  is  the  focus  of  Chris¬ 
tendom.  The  Protestant  hurries  up  to  the  Eternal  City  to  be¬ 
hold  the  scarlet  lady  in  all  her  pomp  and  circumstance,  with 
the  charitable  object  of  seeing  with  his  own  eyes  whether  her 
color  is  not  even  more  deeply  dyed  than  it  has  been  represent¬ 
ed.  The  Catholic  devoutly  makes  his  pilgrimage,  to  lay  alike 
his  sins  and  offerings  on  her  altars,  and  with  renewed  heart 
and  faith  to  carry  back  with  him  the  blessing  and  absolution 
of  Christ’s  vicar  on  earth.  Both  are  not  unfrequently  disap¬ 
pointed.  I  have  known  the  scorning  Protestant  to  go  away 
the  disciple  of  infallibility,  while  the  simple-hearted  Catholic, 
gradually  losing  himself  among  the  mazes  of  doubt  and  hy¬ 
pocrisy,  which,  fungus-like,  cluster  around  the  claims  of  papa¬ 
cy,  at  last  acknowledged  himself  a  pagan,  or  worse,  an  unbe¬ 
liever  in  all  religion. 

No  city,  both  from  its  past  and  present  influence  on  the 
world’s  history,  presents  more  claims  to  interest  than  Rome. 
The  many  who  visit  it  are  as  nothing  in  comparison  with  those 


ITALIAN  SIGHTS  AND  PAPAL  PRINCIPLES. 


225 


who  desire  and  can  not.  I  shall  therefore  give,  for  the  benefit 
of  the  latter  class,  so  far  as  I  am  able,  a  practical  view  of  its 
ceremonies  and  principles  during  that  period  which  it  has  set 
apart  to  commemorate,  with  all  its  sanctity  and  splendor,  as 
one  of  peculiar  solemnity — embracing  the  most  momentous 
events  that  ever  dawned  upon  the  human  race — the  death 
and  resurrection  of  our  Savior.  What  papacy  thus  openly 
spreads  before  the  whole  world  must  be  considered  as  its  re¬ 
ligious  standard.  By  its  effects  on  its  followers  it  can  rightly 
be  judged.  To  keep  within  the  strictest  limits  of  charitable 
evidence,  I  shall  confine  myself  either  to  papal  authorities  or 
ceremonies,  for  it  is  solely  upon  them  that  it  founds  its  high 
pretensions,  and  by  them  exhibits  its  righteousness. 

Bishop  England,  in  a  little  work  published  at  Rome,  entitled 
an  “Explanation  of  the  Ceremonies  of  the  Holy  Week,”  sets 
forth  the  claims  and  objects  of  the  Roman  Church  at  this  par¬ 
ticular  festival.  We,  therefore,  can  not  go  amiss  in  briefly 
quoting  from  him  the  doctrines  which  he  asserts  to  be  ani¬ 
mating  principles  of  the  practices  he  advocates. 

“  The  object,”  he  says,  “  of  our  church-ceremony  is  not  mere 
idle  show  ;  such  exhibitions  would,  in  religion,  be  worse  than 
a  waste  of  time.”  “  God  can  never  be  pleased  by  any  homage 
which  is  not  internal  and  spiritual.”  “  The  legitimate  objects 
of  external  rites  in  religion  are  the  instruction  of  the  mind  and 
amelioration  of  the  heart;  their  object  is  the  promotion  of  en¬ 
lightened  piety.  Whatever  does  not  tend  to  this  is  at  least 
useless,  probably  mischievous.  The  Catholic  Church  is  de¬ 
sirous  of  having  all  her  observances  tested  by  this  principle.^"'  By 
this  principle  I  beg  all,  whether  Protestant  or  Catholic,  to  test 
even  the  few  of  the  manifold  observances  that  I  shall  be  able 
to  quote  within  my  prescribed  limits,  and  to  frankly  confess 
their  own  conclusions  as  to  the  degree  in  which  they  promote 
“  enlightened  piety.” 


ITALIAN  SIGHTS  AND  PAPAL  PRINCIPLES. 


The  Pope,  as  we  all  know,  claims  to  be  the  representative 
of  Christ,  with  spiritual  and  temporal  powers  commensurate 
with  divine  authority.  Although  our  Savior  expressly  de¬ 
clared  his  kingdom  not  to  be  of  this  world,  yet  his  successor 
and  “  visible  head  of  the  ChurcIC'  is  also  a  ^‘‘temporal  sovereign 
and,  in  addition  to  his  ecclesiastical  state,  surrounds  himself 
with  as  brilliant  a  court  as  can  exist,  in  which  females  are  out¬ 
wardly  excluded.  In  judging,  then,  of  these  incompatible 
functions,  a  charitable  distinction  should  be  drawn  between 
that  which  properly  belongs  to  the  one  or  the  other.  Inas¬ 
much,  however,  as  the  temporal  power  had  its  origin  in  his 
spiritual  position,  and  is  intimately  blended  with  it  in  all  its 
phases,  it  will  be  difficult  to  define  the  line  of  demarkation 
between  his  duties  as  high-priest  and  sovereign.  We  must, 
therefore,  take  him  simply  as  he  shows  himself  to  the  adora¬ 
tion  of  the  faithful. 

“llis  throne  is  placed  on  the  Crospel  side  of  the  altar,”  says 
Bishop  England.  From  personal  inspection,  I  can  assure  the 
curious  reader  that  no  imperial  robes  surpass  those  of  the 
Holy  Father  in  rich  and  curious  embroidery,  gold,  precious 
stones,  and  general  value  of  materials  and  cunning  workman¬ 
ship.  Description  would  fail  to  illustrate  the  variety  and 
pomp  of  costume  of  the  Roman  ecclesiastical  courts.  There¬ 
fore  1  shall  present — so  far  as  uncolored  cuts  can — the  extent 
and  costliness  of  this  branch  of  service  of  the  successor  of 
Him  who  exalted  poverty  in  the  priesthood  to  the  rank  of  a 
Aurtue. 


PROCESSION 

FOR  EASTER  SUNDAY. 

Esquires, 

two  and  two,  in  red  serge  cappas,  with  hoods  over  the  shoulders,  etc. 
Proctors  of  the  College, 
two  and  two,  in  black  stuff  cappas,  with  silk  hoods. 

Procuratores  of  religious  orders, 
two  and  two,  in  the  habits  of  their  respective  orders. 


ITALIAN  SIGHTS  AND  PAPAL  PRINCIPLES. 


227 


Ecclesiastical  Chamberlains,  outside  the  city, 

two  and  two,  in  red. 

Chaplains  in  ordinary, 

in  red  cappas,  with  hoods  of  ermine ;  of  whom  there  are 
first  mitre  bearer, 
second  mitre  bearer, 
third  mitre  bearer, 
one  bearer  of  the  tiara. — (Cut  8.) 

Private  Chaplains, 

two  and  two,  red  cappas  and  hoods  of  ermine. 

Consistorial  Advocates, 

two  and  two,  in  black  or  violet  cassocks  and  hoods. 

Ecclesiastical  Chamberlains, 

private  and  honorary,  two  and  two,  in  red  cassocks  and  hoods. 

Choristers  of  the  Chapel, 

two  and  two,  in  violet  silk  cassocks,  over  which  are  surplices. — (Cut  9.) 

Abbreviators  of  the  Park. 

Clerks  of  the  Chamber, 

in  surplices  over  rochets,  two  and  two. 

Master  of  the  sacred  Palace, 

in  his  habit  of  a  Dominican  friar. 

Auditors  of  the  Rota, 

in  surplices  over  rochets,  two  and  two. 

Three  Acolyths,  Irwense  bearer.  Four  Acolyths, 

in  surplices  over  rochets,  .  in  surplices  over  rochets, 

carrying  large  candlesticks  tunic.  (Cut  12.)  carrying  candlesticks  with 


with  lights. 

Greek  Subdeacon. 


lights. 

Greek  Deacon. 


Ui 


O 

s 


7} 

t 

a  ^  ^ 

os  e 

«  g 
^  0-2? 
Cl.  Q  a- 

*  ”  2, 

3  ^ 

o* 


Two  porters  of  the  red  rod 
Latin  Subdeacon, 
in  tunic. 

Penitentiaries  of  St.  Peter's, 

two  and  two,  in  albs  and  chasubles. 

Mitred  Abbots, 

of  whom  only  a  few  are  entitled  to  a  place. 

BISHOPS,  ARCHBISHOPS,  AND  PATRIARCHS, 
two  and  two,  the  Latins  wearing  copes  and  mitres, 
the  Easterns  in  their  proper  costumes. — (Cuts  2-8.) 

CARDINAL  DEACONS, 

in  dalmatics  and  mitres,  each  accompanied  by  his  chamberlain  carrying  his 
square  cap,  and  followed  by  his  train  bearer. 

CARDINAL  PRIESTS, 

in  chasubles  and  mitres,  similarly  attended. — (Cut  11.) 
CARDINAL  BISHOPS, 
in  copes  and  mitres,  similarly  attended. 

General  staff,  and  officers  of  the  guard  of  nobles. 

Grand  herald  and  grand  esquire, 

in  court  dresses. 

Lay  chamberlains. 

Conservators  of  Rome  and  Prior  of  the  magistrates  of  Wards, 

in  vestures  ornamented  with  cloth  of  gold. 

PRINCE  ASSISTANT  AT  THE  THRONE, 
in  a  splendid  court  dress. — (Cut  10.) 

GOVERNOR  OF  ROME, 
in  rochet  and  cappa. 

Two  auditors  of  the  Rota, 

to  serve  as  train  bearers. 

Two  principal  masters  of  ceremony 


CO 


tn 

c 


CO 

r. 

oS-'5 

e  9.  ~ 
p  c 
Pts  : 

c  “ 

S'  I 

5.2c 
...  00  ... 

00  •. 


228 


ITALIAN  SIGHTS  AND  PAPAL  PRINCIPLES 


THE  POFE  TN  HIS  PONTIFICAL  ROBES. 


ITALIAN  SIGHTS  AND  PAPAL  PRINCIPLES. 


229 


CARDINAL  IN  FULL  COSTUME,  4,  CARDINAL  IN  PRIVATE  HABIT, 


230 


ITALIAN  SIGHTS  AND  PAPAL  PRINCIPLES, 


GREEK  BISHOP.  6.  SYRIAN  BISHOP, 


ITALIAN  SIGHTS  AND  PAPAL  PRINCIPLES. 


231 


ARMENIAN  BISHOP.  8.  BEARER  OF  THE  TIARA, 


232 


ITALIAN  SIGHTS  AND  PAPAL  PRINCIPLES 


CHORISTER. 


ITALIAN  SIGHTS  AND  PAPAL  PRINCIPLES 


233 


11.  CARDINAL  PRIEST.  12.  CROSS-BEARER. 


234 


ITALIAN  SIGHTS  AND  PAPAL  PRINCIPLES 


13.  THE  POPE.  14.  PRIVATE  CHAMBERLAIN. 


ITALIAN  SIGHTS  AND  PAPAL  PRINCIPLES- 


235 


16.  CAPTAIN  OF  SWISS  GUARD. 


236 


ITALIAN  SIGHTS  AND  PAPAL  PRINCIPLES 


17.  PRIVATE  OF  SWISS  GUARD.  18.  GUARD  OF  NOBLES. 


ITALIAN  SIGHTS  AND  PAPAL  PRINCIPLES 


00*7 


19.  MACE-BEARER,  20.  CHAMBERLAIN  OF  SWORD  AND  CLOAK. 


238 


ITALIAN  SIGHTS  AND  PAPAL  PRINCIPLES. 


CARDINAL  DEACON,  CARDINAL  DEACON,  CARDINAL  DEACON, 

second  assistant  at  the  for  the  Latin  Gospel  and  mass,  first  assistant  at  the  throne, 
throne,  Fan  borne  by  a  pri-  Fan  borne  by  a  private 

vate  chamberlain.  THE  POPE— (Cut  13)  chamberlain.— (Cut  14.) 

wearing  a  white  cope  and  tiara, 

borne  in  his  chair  by  twelve  supporters — (Cut  15 — Pope's  chair-hearer  in  livery) — in 
red  damask,  under  a  canopy  sustained  by  eight  referendaries  of  the  signature,  in 
short  violet  mantles  over  rochets. 

His  holiness  is  surrounded  by  his  household.  Six  of  the  Swiss  guards,  representing 
the  Catholic  cantons,  carry  large  drawn  swords  on  their  shoulders. 

Private  chamberlain.  Dean  of  the  Rota,  Private  chamberlain, 

in  rochet  and  cappa.  of  sword  and  cloak. — (Cut  20.) 
MAJOR  DOMO,  AUDITOR  OF  THE  APOSTOLIC  CAMERA,  TREASURER, 

in  rochets  and  cappas. 

Prothonotaries  apostolic, 

Regent  of  the  chancery  and  auditor  of  contradictions, 
all  in  rochets  and  cappas,  two  and  two. 

Generals  of  religious  orders, 
two  and  two.  in  their  proper  habits. 

On  the  cope  of  bright  purple  color  which  the  Pope  wears  on 
Palm  Sunday  is  a  silver  plate  richly  gilt,  bearing,  in  beautiful 
relief,  the  figure  of  the  Almighty.  This  was  formerly  of  pure 
gold,  surrounded  by  three  knobs  of  costly  Oriental  pearls  ;  but 
the  cupidity  of  the  enemies  of  Pius  VI.  overcame  their  fear  of 
sacrilege,  and  they  appropriated  it  to  other  purposes.  Ben¬ 
venuto  Cellini,  who  was  employed  by  Clement  VII.  to  engrave 
this  plate,  says,  somewhat  blasphemously,  though  in  true  artis¬ 
tic  spirit,  that  he  endeavored  to  represent  the  “  Almighty  Fa¬ 
ther  in  a  free  and  easy  position.” 

His  Holiness  selects  the  cardinals,  seventy  in  number,  who 
form  the  high  senate  of  the  Church  and  the  privy  council  of 
the  Pope.  They  in  turn  elect  the  Pope  from  their  own  num¬ 
ber.  In  costume  they  are  a  shade  less  brilliant  than  the  Holy 
F  ather,  wearing,  when  in  chapel,  red  cassocks  with  gold  tassels, 
red  stockings,  white  ermine  tippets,  and  red  skull  or  square 
caps.  On  solemn  occasions  they  add  red  shoes  and  white 
damask  silk  mitres,  with  other  changes  of  raiment,  telling  with 
great  effect  in  a  procession,  but  tedious  in  description. 

Throughout  the  whole  edifice  of  the  Roman  hierarchy,  cos¬ 
tume  forms  a  very  important  and  conspicuous  part.  It  is  nice¬ 
ly  graduated  with  decreasing  splendor  and  diversified  cut  from 


ITALIAN  SIGHTS  AND  PAPAL  PRINCIPLES. 


239 


the  pope,  cardinals,  archbishops,  and  the  inferior  clergy,  who 
are  almost  lost  amid  richly-laced  petticoats  and  purple  skirts, 
to  the  laughable  attire  of  the  sacristans,  choristers,  and  the 
dirty  and  dolorous  robes  of  the  monastic  orders.  Each  rank 
has  its  mark  and  number,  and  it  must  be  confessed  that  no 
military  display  can  compete,  in  variety  and  brilliancy  of  colors 
and  costliness  of  uniform,  with  one  got  up  by  the  Church.  The 
nomenclature  of  papal  costume  is  intelligible  only  to  those  who 
pass  their  lives  in  wearing  it.  Each  article  has  its  peculiar 
uses  and  degree  of  sanctity. 

The  etiquette  of  the  papal  court,  whether  in  its  spiritual  or 
temporal  sense,  is  no  light  service.  To  give  an  idea  of  the 
number  and»  variety  of  officers  attached  to  it,  I  have  given  a 
programme  of  the  Procession  for  Easter  Sunday  as  it  appears 
in  Saint  Peter’s  previous  to  High  Mass  and  the  G-eneral  Bene¬ 
diction  and  Excommunication.  The  engravings  given  of  sev¬ 
eral  of  these  ecclesiastical  personages  and  their  suites  will 
bear  out  the  assertion  that  no  operatic  or  theatrical  spectacle 
can  pretend  to  vie  with  the  papal  court  when  it  dons  its  holi¬ 
day  suit.  Imagine  the  surprise  of  St.  Peter,  were  he  to  be 
present,  upon  being  told  that  that  sleepy-looking  old  gentle¬ 
man,  so  buried  in  gold  and  jewels  as  scarcely  to  be  discerni¬ 
ble,  and  borne  under  a  magnificent  canopy  on  the  shoulders  of 
twelve  men  clothed  in  the  brightest  scarlet,  performing  the 
pantomime  of  turning  from  one  side  to  another  his  uplifted 
thumb  and  two  fingers  as  illustrative  of  the  blessing  of  the 
Holy  Trinity,  was  his  successor  !  I  question  whether  at  such 
a  sacrilegious  libel  the  old  Adam  within  him  would  not  be 
more  signally  displayed  than  it  even  was  in  the  garden,  for 
the  zealous  apostle  would  least  of  all  forgive  humbug.  I  speak 
only  of  the  effect  on  my  own  mind,  contrasted  with  what  I 
conceive  to  be  the  proper  display  of  that  religion  which  con¬ 
sists  in  visiting  and  comforting  the  fatherless  and  widows  in 


240 


ITALIAN  SIGHTS  AND  PAPAL  PRINCIPLES. 


their  affliction.  There  are  others,  as  we  often  see,  on  whom 
the  glitter  of  a  court,  or  the  music  and  architecture  of  a  church, 
have  greater  weight  than  the  humility  and  simplicity  of  Gos¬ 
pel  truth.  They  would  be  loth  to  confess  that  the  avenue  to 
their  minds  and  hearts  closed  with  their  eyes  and  ears  i  but 
take  away  the  curiously  wrought  robes,  the  cunning  of  the  ar¬ 
tificer,  the  genius  of  the  artist,  the  harmonies  of  music,  and  the 
entire  combination  of  pomp  and  venerable  tradition  by  which 
Rome  upholds  her  religion,  and  how  much  of  faith  and  con¬ 
viction  would  be  left  to  them  ? 

Besides  the  officers  who  figure  in  the  above  procession,  there 
are  a  legion  of  others  attached  to  the  court,  which  swell  its 
bulk  to  a  degree  that  weighs  heavily  upon  the  petty  temporal 
dominions  of  the  Popes,  and  is  out  of  all  proportion  to  their 
necessities.  There  are  private  gentlemen  of  the  bed-chamber, 
and  among  them  a  secret  treasurer,  who  purveys  for  the  alms 
and  amusement  of  the  Pope.  So  little  bodily  exercise  does 
the  Roman  etiquette  allow  to  the  successors  of  the  fisherman, 
that  his  present  Holiness  has  been  ordered  by  his  physician 
to  play  at  billiards  daily,  to  counteract  his  tendency  to  obesity. 

There  are  one  hundred  and  eight  officers  and  valets,  under 
different  titles,  attached  to  the  personal  service  of  the  Pope  ;  a 
modest  number,  when  the  extent  of  his  several  palaces  is  con¬ 
sidered.  No  sovereign  pays  the  penalty  of  greatness  more 
severely  than  the  Holy  Father.  His  sanctity  dooms  him  per¬ 
petually  to  solitary  meals,  except  on  extraordinary  occasions, 
there  being  no  one  on  earth  sufficiently  elevated  to  sit  as  an 
equal  at  table  with  him.  This  is  the  rule  ;  but  a  spiritual  Pope 
no  doubt  finds  means  occasionally  to  reconcile  his  social  in¬ 
stincts  and  rank  at  the  same  time.  Then,  too,  every  dish  must 
be  previously  tasted,  for  fear  of  poison  ;  an  antiquated  custom, 
which  at  present  no  one  would  conceive  to  have  any  founda¬ 
tion  in  necessity.  His  chambers  are  coldly  splendid.  Mar- 


ITALIAN  SIGHTS  AND  PAPAL  PRINCIPLES. 


241 


bles,  paintings,  mosaics,  and  gilding  there  are  in  abundance, 
but  the  whole  arranged  with  more  than  the  usual  chilling 
aspect  of  a  state  palace.  His  private  rooms,  no  doubt,  are 
more  comfortable,  but  the  whole  state  and  circumstance  that 
surround  a  Pope,  so  far  as  the  public  eye  can  judge,  is  one 
which  makes  him,  in  all  the  relations  of  personal  freedom  and 
enjoyment,  a  being  little  to  be  envied.  Each  natural  instinct 
and  generous  impulse  is  so  hedged  in  with  sacred  etiquette  or 
pusillanimous  fear  as  to  be  a  torture  rather  than  a  pleasure  to 
its  possessor.  A  bad  Pope  can  be  personally  free  only  by  be¬ 
ing  a  hypocrite ;  a  good  Pope  is  a  martyr  to  a  rank  which  in 
its  daily  duties  involves  a  constant  contradiction  of  the  sim¬ 
plest  principles  of  Christianity,  and  is  a  standing  reproach 
upon  common  sense. 

All  access  to  the  Pope  is  guarded  with  mysterious  care. 
He  has  his  private  chamber-men — not  maids — private  cooks, 
sweepers,  and  domestics  of  all  classes.  Besides  these,  he  has 
his  confessor,  preacher,  chaplains — queer  necessities  these  for 
the  fountain-head  of  religion — his  porters,  jesters,  poultrymen, 
and  muleteers.  These  all  have  rank  and  appointments  in  the 
sacred  household,  mingling  strangely  with  “  monsignori”  the 
secretaries  of  state  and  other  officials.  The  private  chamber¬ 
lains  who  wait  in  the  ante-chambers  are  clergymen.  In  imi¬ 
tation  of  imperial  courts,  we  find  cup-bearers,  masters  of  the 
wardrobe,  grand  esquires,  private  chamberlains  of  the  sword 
and  cloak^  who  wear  the  black-spangled  dress,  the  most  grace¬ 
ful  of  all  court  costumes,  and  a  guard  of  nobles  magnificently 
uniformed,  a  section  of  which  attends  at  divine  service  in  the 
Pope’s  chapel  with  drawn  sicords. 

Each  cardinal  and  high  officer  has  a  little  court  of  his  own. 
When  the  revenues  of  Christendom  flowed  into  the  papal 
treasury,  it  was  not  difficult  to  maintain  this  state  and  ex¬ 
pense  ;  but,  now  that  it  falls  mainly  on  the  Roman  Sacristory, 

L 


242 


ITALIAN  SIGHTS  AND  PAPAL  PRINCIPLES. 


it  becomes  a  burden  which  Christian  humility  might  consist¬ 
ently  seek  to  lighten.  When  there  exists  so  numerous  a  corps 
of  servants,  whether  of  the  household  or  Church,  invention 
must  be  racked  to  find  employment  for  them ;  consequently, 
we  are  not  surprised  to  see  that  during  high  Church  ceremo¬ 
nies — for  instance,  on  Palm  Sunday — it  requires  “  a  prince, 
an  auditor  of  the  rota,  two  clerks  of  the  chamber,  and  two 
rnace-bearers”  to  present  a  basin  of  water  to  the  Pope,  in 
which  he  washes  his  hands,  while  a  cardinal  dean  holds  the 
towel,  a  senior  cardinal  priest  hands  him  the  incense,  which 
he  puts  into  a  censer  held  by  the  “  senior  voter  of  the  signa¬ 
ture.”  Verily,  St.  Peter  could  have  written  all  his  epistles  in 
much  less  time  than  it  would  have  taken  him  to  learn  the  ti¬ 
tles  and  employments  of  the  household  of  his  successors  in  the 
nineteenth  century  !  “  In  the  sacred  functions  of  the  altar, 

when  the  Pope  assists  without  officiating,”  says  Bishop  En¬ 
gland,  “  he  selects  the  officers  from  a  number  of  names  pre¬ 
sented  by  the  chapters  of  each  of  the  three  patriarchal  basil- 
ics,  selecting  always  a  nobleman,  if  his  other  qualifications  be 
equal  to  those  of  his  associates” — the  wisdom  of  which  choice, 
and  its  consistency  with  Christianity,  all  Republicans  can  not 
fail  to  perceive. 

The  mode  of  electing  a  Pope  is  curious.  The  conclave  is 
the  assemblage  of  cardinals  for  that  purpose.  They  select 
their  own  place  of  meeting,  in  general  choosing  simply  be¬ 
tween  the  Vatican  or  Gtuirinal  palaces. 

The  day  after  the  last  day  of  the  funeral  ceremonies  of  a 
deceased  Pope,  the  mass  of  the  Holy  Ghost  is  repeated  with 
great  solemnity,  a  Latin  discourse  pronounced,  and  the  proces¬ 
sion  of  cardinals  enters  the  chapel,  chanting  Ve7ii  Creator. 
The  bulls  concerning  the  election  are  read,  and  the  cardinal 
dean  harangues  them  upon  the  duties  prescribed  for  the  oc¬ 
casion.  Each  cardinal  then  takes  his  place  in  the  conclave. 


ITALIAN  SIGHTS  AND  PAPAL  PRINCIPLES. 


243 


THE  COIIPSE  OF  THE  POPE  EXPOSED. 


that  is,  retires  to  his  cell,  a  small  room  of  about  twelve  feet 
square,  modestly  furnished  by  himself,  with  his  arms  over  the 
door.  These  cells  are  all  alike,  upon  the  same  floor,  and  ar¬ 
ranged  in  galleries.  Chimneys  are  not  ]iermitted,  warmth 


244 


ITALIAN  SIGHTS  AND  PAPAL  PRINCIPJ.ES. 


being  communicated  from  the  neighboring  rooms.  To  make 
the  isolation  complete,  in  winter  the  windows  are  all  built  up, 
excepting  a  single  pane.  In  summer  the  cardinals  are  per¬ 
mitted  to  look  into  the  garden. 

For  the  service  of  each  cell  there  is  allowed  a  secretary  and 
one  gentleman,  who  are  obliged  to  perform  the  duties  of  do¬ 
mestics  ;  but  as  the  emoluments  are  great,  consisting  of  a  con¬ 
siderable  sum  before  the  conclave,  and  a  distribution  of  ten 
thousand  crowns  by  the  new  Pope  after  his  election,  besides 
certain  advantages  for  their  future  career,  these  posts  are  much 
sought  after  by  the  younger  ecclesiastics. 

The  conclave  is  allowed  also  the  services  of  a  sacristan,  two 
sub-sacristans,  a  confessor,  four  masters  of  ceremonies,  two 
physicians,  an  apothecary,  three  barbers,  a  mason,  a  carpenter, 
and  twelve  valets,  whose  livery  is  violet. 

Before  the  cardinals  enter  into  conclave,  should  any  feel 
not  adequate  to  the  discipline  about  to  be  imposed  upon  them, 
he  is  warned  to  retire.  Once  in  conclave,  they  are  placed  in 
solitary  confinement,  each  in  his  own  cell.  Every  avenue  to 
the  palaee  is  strictly  guarded  by  detachments  of  soldiers,  and 
each  door  carefully  closed.  The  only  communication  from 
without  is  by  means  of  small  revolving  shelves  or  boxes,  like 
the  “  tours'’’  of  foundling  hospitals,  through  which  the  meals 
are  passed,  and  also  any  official  communications,  but  only  in 
the  presencd  and  with  the  approbation  of  their  military  guar¬ 
dians.  Vocal  intercourse  is  permitted  only  at  certain  high 
apertures  in  the  walls,  in  Italian,  and  with  raised  voices,  so 
that  the  guards  can  hear  and  understand  the  conversation. 
The  utmost  precautions  are  taken  to  prevent  the  inmates  of 
adjoining  cells  from  communicating  witli  each  other.  If  a 
cardinal  become  ill,  he  is  permitted  to  go  out,  but  he  can  not 
re-enter  his  cell  during  the  conclave. 

Before  the  closing  of  the  conclave,  a  final  day  is  permitted 


DINNER  DURING  THE  CONCLAVE 


‘246 


ITALIAN  SIGHTS  AND  PAPAL  PRINCIPLES. 


to  the  visits  and  conferences  of  the  cardinals,  in  the  hall  ar¬ 
ranged  for  that  purpose.  These  interviews  are  according  to 
prescribed  rules. 

All  the  expenses  of  the  conclave  are  borne  by  the'  Apostolic 
Chamber.  Among  these,  the  meals  are  not  the  least.  As 
nothing  is  done  in  Rome  without  a  procession,  the  dinners  of 
the  cardinals  are  served  up  in  the  same  manner.  The  order 
is  as  follows : 

At  the  head,  two  footmen  with  wooden  maces. 

A  valet  with  the  silver. 

The  gentlemen  in  service,  two  by  two,  bare-headed. 

The  chief  cook,  with  a  napkin  on  his  shoulder. 

Cup-bearers  and  esquires. 

Two  footmen,  carrying  upon  their  shoulders  a  huge  dish- 
warmer,  containing  the  meats,  &c. 

Then  follow  the  valets,  with  wine  and  fruit  in  baskets. 

Upon  arriving  at  the  palace,  each  cardinal  is  visited  in  turn 
by  the  procession,  and  his  dinner  deposited.  But,  before  this 
Is  done,  every  dish  is  inspected,  lest  some  letter  or  message 
should  be  concealed  within  the  viands.  The  bottles  and 
glasses  are  required  to  be  transparent,  and  the  vases  suffi¬ 
ciently  shallow  to  show  their  depths.  With  all  these  precau¬ 
tions,  however,  diplomatic  ingenuity  at  times  contrives  to  con¬ 
vey  hidden  communications.  The  fruits  often  speak  intelli¬ 
gibly  for  themselves.  A  truffle  has  served  to  baffle  a  rival 
combination,  and  destroy  a  choice  fixed  upon  for  the  succeed¬ 
ing  day.  This  species  of  culinary  diplomacy  was  due,  as 
might  be  expected,  to  an  embassador  of  France. 

There  are  four  modes  of  electing  the  Pope :  the  “  adora¬ 
tion,”  the  “  compromise,”  the  “  scrutin,’’’  and  the  “  accessit.” 

The  votes  are  deposited  by  the  cardinals,  according  to  cer¬ 
tain  prescribed  rules,  in  a  chalice  placed  upon  an  altar,  either 
in  the  Sistine  Chapel,  or  one  of  the  same  dimensions  at  the 


ITALIAN  SIGHTS  AND  PAPAL  PRINCIPLES. 


'IM 


duirinal.  They  are  summoned  twice  a  day,  at  six  in  the 
morning  and  at  the  same  hour  of  the  evening,  to  deposit  their 
votes.  These  are  carried  by  themselves  on  golden  plates. 
Each  bulletin  containing  the  vote  is  carefully  sealed,  and 
stamped  with  some  fanciful  design  known  only  to  the  voter, 
and  prepared  expressly  for  his  vote.  Great  care  is  also  taken 
to  disguise  the  handwriting,  so  that  no  external  clew  to  the 
voter’s  choice  can  be  detected.  This  act  is  preceded  by  an 
oath  to  choose  whom  they  believe  the  most  worthy,  and  is 
accompanied  by  sacred  chants.  The  officers  designated  by 
lot  to  examine  the  votes,  inspect  them  with  the  most  minute 
attention  and  precautions,  for  fear  of  fraud.  If  a  cardinal  has 
obtained  two  thirds  of  the  votes,  they  are  verified  by  compar¬ 
ing  the  names  of  the  voters  with  their  chosen  devices.  Should 
two  thirds  of  the  votes  be  wanting  to  one  name,  the  bulletins 
are  burned,  and  the  voting  commences  anew.  The  smoke 
which  arises  from  the  chimney  attached  to  the  chapel  at  this 
hour  telegraphs  to  an  expectant  crowd  without  the  failure  of 
the  vote. 

Election  by  “  adoration”  is  when  a  cardinal,  in  giving  his 
vote,  goes  toward  his  candidate,  proclaiming  him  the  Head  of 
the  Church,  and  is  followed  by  two  thirds  of  the  cardinals  im¬ 
itating  his  example.  The  “  compromise”  is  when  the  uncer¬ 
tain  suffrages  are  given  to  certain  members  of  the  conclave 
from  which  to  elect  a  Pope.  The  “  scrutin”  is  the  secret  bal¬ 
lot.  The  “  accessit”  is  the  last  resource  for  a  choice,  but  as  it 
is  seldom  resorted  to,  and  I  do  not  clearly  comprehend  the  pro¬ 
cess  myself,  I  can  not  give  it  to  my  readers.  During  the  ex¬ 
amination  of  the  votes  by  secret  ballot,  the  cardinals  say 
masses  upon  the  six  altars  of  the  chapel. 

The  excessive  precautions  taken  to  insure  purity  of  choice 
betray  the  extent  to  which  faction  and  corruption  must  have 
intruded  into  these  elections.  In  times  past,  the  most  scan- 


248 


ITALIAN  SIGHTS  AND  PAPAL  PRINCIPLES 


dalous  scenes  have  preceded’ and  accompanied  the  intrigues 
which,  despite  the  severity  of  the  regulations,  find  entrance 
into  the  holy  conclave,  splitting  it  into  unholy  factions.  Dur¬ 
ing  the  comparatively  recent  conclave  which  resulted  in  the 
election  of  Pius  VL,  the  cardinals  even  proceeded  to  blows, 
and  their  excitement  rivaled  the  worst  scenes  that  have  ever 
occurred  in  any  democratic  Congress. 


After  his  election,  the  Pope  selects  the  name  by  which  he 


ITALIAN  SIGHTS  AND  PAPAL  PRINCIPLES 


249 


wishes  to  be  known.  The  Master  of  Ceremonies  then  clothes 
him  in  the  papal  vestments,  and  the  cardinals,  each  in  turn, 
kiss  his  hands  and  feet,  the  Pope  giving  them  upon  the  right 
cheek  the  kiss  of  peace.  They  then  chant,  “  Behold  the  high- 
priest,  pleasing  to  God,  and  found  just !”  The  guns  of  St.  An¬ 
gelo  thunder  forth  a  salute,  every  bell  of  the  city  augments  the 
joyous  clamor,  and  drums,  trumpets,  and  timbrels,  amid  the 
acclamations  of  the  people — if  the  election  be  a  popular  one — 
complete  the  noisy  chorus. 

After  a  special  adoration  in  the  Sistine  Chapel,  the  Pope 
seats  himself  under  a  red  canopy  before  the  grand  altar  in  St. 
Peter’s,  where  he  receives  the  adoration  of  the  people.  This 
finished,  he  is  borne  in  grand  procession  to  the  palace  which 
he  selects  for  his  residence.  In  the  adoration  paid  to  the  Pope, 
enlightened  Romanists  disclaim,  and  with  justice,  no  doubt, 
any  act  of  personal  idolatry.  But  while  they  render  the  same 
forms  of  homage  to  a  man  which  we  are  taught  to  believe  are 
due  only  to  God,  it  will  be  difficult  for  the  mass  to  discrimin¬ 
ate  the  nice  distinction  they  would  make.  Their  example,  at 
all  events,  is  so  much  weight  in  the  scale  of  idolatry,  while 
their  motives  are  far  beyond  the  capacity  of  ignorant  minds  to 
comprehend. 

During  the  interval  between  the  death  of  one  pope  and  the 
election  of  another,  the  papal  functions  are  administered  by  an 
officer  called  the  “  Camerlingue,”  or  Cardinal  President,  of  the 
court  of  Rome.  He  holds  one  of  the  three  keys  of  the  treasure 
of  the  Castle  of  St.  Angelo,  the  dean  of  the  sacred  college  an¬ 
other,  and  the  Pope  the  third. 

The  unity  and  policy  of  the  papal  court  is  undoubtedly  the 
same  in  all  ages,  so  far  as  concerns  its  claims  to  temporal  and 
spiritual  power.  Were  it  not  counteracted  by  the  spirit  of  the 
age,  there  is  no  reason  to  believe  it  would  not  now  assert  its 

authority  as  distinctly  and  frankly  as  in  the  thirteenth  century. 

•  •  •»  • 

L  2 


250 


ITALIAN  SIGHTS  AND  PAPAL  PRINCIPLES. 


in  the  mandate  of  Nicholas  III.,  cited  in  the  ninety-sixth  dis¬ 
tinction  of  the  canon  law,  viz. : 

“  It  is  evident  that  the  Roman  pontiff  can  not  be  judged  of 
man,  because  he  is  God  !” 

In  a  bull  of  Gregory  IX.,  inserted  in  the  Decretals  under 
the  title  of  “  Pre-eminence,”  we  read  as  follows  : 


THE  POPE  BOBNE  TO  HIS  RESIDENCE. 


ITALIAN  SIGHTS  AND  PAPAL  PRINCIPLES. 


251 


“  God  has  made  two  great  lights  for  the  firmament  of  the 
univexsal  Church — that  is  to  say,  he  has  instituted  two  digni¬ 
ties  :  these  are  the  pontifical  authority  and  the  royal  power ; 
but  that  which  rules  in  these  days,  that  is  to  say,  over  things 
spiritual,  is  the  greater,  and  that  which  presides  over  things 
material  the  lesser.  Therefore  all  should  know  that  there  is 
as  much  difference  between  pontiffs  and  kings  as  between  the 
sun  and  moon.  We  say  that  every  human  creature  is  sub¬ 
jected  to  the  sovereign  pontiff,  and  that  he  can  (according  to 
the  decretal  of  Innocent  III.,  called  the  Prebends),  in  virtue  of 
his  full  power  and  sovereign  authority,  dispose  of  the  natural 
and  divine  right.” 

At  this  age  of  the  world  we  may  smile  at  these  doctrines. 
But  the  spirit  which  conceived  them  still  exists,  though  the 
power  then  enforced  has  departed.  The  haughty  ceremonies 
that  accompanied  these  assumptions  of  power  are  yet  in  full 
sway,  yearly  growing  in  imbecility,  as  the  authority  which 
alone  could  make  them  respected  becomes  more  remote.  That 
which  once  carried  with  it  terrible  meaning,  has  now  degen¬ 
erated  into  pitiful  farce.  Spectators  now  gather  to  Rome  dur¬ 
ing  holy  festivals,  not  to  worship  or  to  acknowledge  the  great 
head  of  the  Christian  Church,  but  to  wonder  at  the  debasing 
shows  proffered,  and  the  haughty  magnificence  displayed  by 
priests  who  found  their  creed  on  a  gospel  of  humility  and  love. 
Should  these  remarks  be  construed  as  uncharitable,  I  can  only 
add  that  where  religion,  as  I  intend  showing,  is  metamorphosed 
designedly  into  a  mere  spectacle,  it  must  expect  to  be  subject¬ 
ed  to  the  ordinary  laws  of  criticism. 


CHAPTER  IX.' 


THE  HOLY  WEEK  AT  ROME. - PAPAL  CEREMONIES. 

The  grand  object  of  the  Roman  Catholic  Church  in  its  ob¬ 
servance  of  the  Easter  festival,  as  stated  by  Bishop  England, 
is  “  to  use  the  most  natural  and  efficacious  mode  of  so  exhibit¬ 
ing  to  a  redeemed  race  the  tragic  occurrences  of  the  very  ca¬ 
tastrophe  by  which  that  redemption  was  effectuated,  as  to  pro¬ 
duce  deep  impressions  for  their  religious  improvement,”  and 
he  hazards  the  following  observation,  that  “  if  the  multiplica¬ 
tion  of  rites  be  superstition,  then  is  the  God  of  Sinai  its  most 
powerful  abettor.”  Acting  upon  this  view  of  the  inspired 
word,  the  Church  of  Rome  combines  “  music,  scenery,  action, 
and  poetry”  into  a  grand  melodrama  to  excite  those  emotions 
in  the  minds  of  its  disciples  which  it  substitutes  for  religion, 
or,  to  use  the  words  of  its  expounder,  “  to  bring  the  mind  to 
any  particular  frame,”  so  that  “  the  effect  is  almost  irresistible.” 

There  was  a  period,  doubtless,  in  the  history  of  Christianity, 
when  certain  religious  transactions,  simply  given  in  a  pictorial 
manner,  were  not  without  efficacy  in  arousing  heathen  minds 
to  inquiry  and  interest ;  but,  multiplied  and  diverted  as  they 
have  since  been  from  their  original  purposes,  they  are  now 
presented  to  us  more  as  a  theatrical  resource  to  sustain  and 
show  off  priestcraft  than  as  illustrating  the  truths  of  the  Bible. 
Yet  I  would  not  be  understood  as  asserting  that  there  are  no 
hearts  moved,  even  in  this  age,  to  a  clearer  appreciation  of 
the  sublime  doctrines  which  they  are  intended  to  illustrate  by 
these  subtle  appeals  to  the  senses  and  the  imagination.  Many 


i.U^  AT  aOiVIF.. 


254 


ITALIAN  SIGHTS  AND  PAPAL  PRINCIPLES. 


a  simple  Romanist  bows  in  adoring  faith  before  image  or  relic, 
and  arises  from  his  devotion  justified  before  God,  as  was  the 
poor  publican  in  the  Temple  who  beat  his  breast  and  cried, 
“  Have  mercy  upon  me,  a  miserable  sinner,”  while  the  skep¬ 
tical  Pharisee,  who  thanked  Heaven  that  he  was  not  as  other 
men,  left  with  additional  sin  upon  his  heart.  The  sin  lies  not 
with  those  who  believe,  but  upon  them  who  deceive  those  that 
“hunger  and  thirst  after  righteousness.”  If  the  ceremonies 
of  the  Roman  Catholic  Church,  to  which  I  shall  allude,  are 
the  “  bread  of  life,”  then  is  her  skirt  free  from  this  great 
wickedness  ;  but  if,  on  the  contrary,  they  confirm  mankind  in 
superstition,  substituting  evanescent  emotion  for  practical  pi¬ 
ety,  and  shut  the  gates  of  heaven  to  all  except  those  who  bow’ 
before  their  idols  and  leave  their  gifts  at  her  shrine,  then,  in¬ 
deed,  have  the  enlightened  men  who  have  upheld  and  sanc¬ 
tioned  a  system  so  much  at  variance  with  the  simple  precepts 
of  the  Gospel  and  the  example  of  its  Author  incurred  a  weighty 
responsibility. 

A  fortnight  before  Easter,  the  church  edifices  are  all  put  in 
mourning,  the  ornaments  generally  removed,  pictures  veiled, 
and  crosses  clothed  in  violet,  in  token  of  grief  and  penance. 
During  this  period,  the  greatest  activity  prevails  in  prepara¬ 
tions  for  the  coming  solemnities.  Each  church  seeks  to  dis¬ 
tinguish  itself  above  its  rivals  by  the  splendor  of  its  decora¬ 
tions,  its  pomp,  music,  lights,  and  all  those  outward  appliances 
to  attract  the  eye,  in  which  the  Roman  people  for  upward  of 
two  thousand  years  have  been  so  curious  and  critical.  All 
the  communities  of  sisters  are  as  busy  as  so  many  hives  of 
bees,  with  the  needle,  embroidering,  sewing,  plaiting,  bleach¬ 
ing,  or  repairing  the  linen  of  the  altar,  the  damasks  and  velvet 
hangings  of  the  churches,  and  the  robes  of  the  priesthood.  To 
them,  as  to  their  isolated  brothers,  the  monks,  the  coming  spec¬ 
tacles  are  an  event  in  their  monotonous  lives,  and  they  enter 


ITALIAN  SIGHTS  AND  PAPAL  PRINCIPLES. 


2n5 


upon  the  work  of  preparation  with  all  the  zest  of  secular  am¬ 
bition,  all  striving  to  exalt  the  object  of  their  labors  before 
God  and  man  by  the  splendor  of  their  work.  Their  degree  of 
success  promotes  correspondingly  the  veneration  or  enthusi¬ 
asm  of  the  people  toward  the  particular  patron  saint  they  thus 
delight  to  honor.  Consequently,  upon  the  good  works  of  their 
hands  hangs,  in  no  small  part,  the  piety  of  their  congrega¬ 
tions,  for,  as  we  have  seen,  their  avowed  object  is  to  create  a 
powerful  impression  upon  the  imagination.  The  Holy  Week 
comprises  the  profoundest  griefs  and  the  greatest  joys  of  the 
Church — including,  as  it  does,  the  crucifixion  and  resurrection 
of  the  Savior.  All  that  human  ingenuity  and  expense  can 
provide  to  make  apparent  the  one  and  give  eclat  to  the  other, 
is  lavished  upon  the  ceremonies  of  this  festival. 

Rome  overflows  with  a  gaping,  wondering,  worshiping,  or 
skeptical  multitude.  Whatever  may  be  the  creed  of  each  in¬ 
dividual,  or  whether  of  no  creed  at  all,  the  entire  mass  come 
up  to  gaze  upon  the  show.  Albano,  Frascati,  Tivoli,  and  all 
the  neighboring  towns,  pour  in  their  picturesque  and  hand¬ 
some  population  by  tens  of  thousands.  On  a  transalpine 
stranger,  no  portion  of  this  grand  gala  makes  a  more  agreeable 
impression  than  the  variety  and  beauty  of  the  costumes  and 
races  about  Rome.  Slouched-capped  pilgrims,  with  staves, 
cockle-shells,  and  scrips,  are  scarcer  now  than  a  few  centuries 
back,  but  enough  are  to  be  seen  to  complete  the  romantic  hu¬ 
man  variety  which  Rome  calls  from  the  four  quarters  of  the 
globe  to  witness  the  pride  of  her  abasement.  Every  Europe¬ 
an  country  sends  its  representatives,  and  even  the  Republic¬ 
ans  of  America  add  greatly  to  the  throng. 

Rome  at  no  time  has  much  to  boast  of  in  the  extent  and 
cleanliness  of  its  accommodations.  It  is  a  city  a  century  be¬ 
hind  all  other  European  capitals  in  every  public  convenience 
except  good  water,  in  which — a  legacy  from  imperial  Rome — 


256 


ITALIAN  .SIGHTS  AND  PAPAL  PRINCIPLES. 


it  is  as  far  ahead  of  them,  possessing  fountains  and  aqueducts 
sufficient  for  the  wants  of  a  million  souls.  The  result  is,  that 
during  Holy  Week  Home  is  crowded  to  an  extent  that  Paris, 
in  its  most  brilliant  fetes,  never  realized.  Prices  are  quadru¬ 
pled  ;  indeed,  there  is  no  limit  to  the  demand  of  a  Roman 
where  the  necessity  is  pressing.  Every  hotel  and  apartment 


ITALIAN  SIGHTS  AND  PAPAL  PRINCIPLES. 


257 


is  crammed  at  prices  which  rival  those  of  California  when, 
houses  were  scarcer  than  golden  ingots.  Alas  for  those  tardy 
ones  who  arrive  hut  a  few  days  before  Palm  Sunday !  They 
are  to  be  seen  anxiously  driving  from  hotel  to  hotel,  and  from 
apartment  to  apartment,  imploring  to  be  “  taken  in”  on  any 
terms,  paying  for  the  carriage  gold  in  lieu  of  silver,  and  at  last 
content  to  mount  some  hundred  steps,  grimed,  one  would  sup¬ 
pose,  with  the  accumulated  filth  of  centuries,  to  a  dimly-light¬ 
ed  back  room,  a  few  feet  square,  containing  little  else  but  an 
apology  for  a  bed,  on  which  perhaps  two  or  three  are  to  take 
their  slumbers  at  the  rate  of  ten  dollars  per  night.  Such  is 
not  a  rare  experience.  Others  fare  worse  and  pay  less.  Some 
are  compelled  to  pass  the  night  in  their  carriages.  Friends  of 
mine  paid  a  dollar  each  for  the  use  of  chairs  at  a  cafe  until 
morning — a  counter  to  sleep  upon  was  an  unexpected  luxury. 
Others  even  were  compelled  to  find  quarters  in  towns  ten  or 
twelve  miles  from  Rome. 

A  Roman  shop-keeper  or  landlord  is  at  all  times  a  stolid, 
proud  character,  indifterent  whether  you  buy,  and  careless 
whether  you  are  accommodated.  The  former,  at  times,  is  too 
lazy  to  take  down  his  own  wares  for  a  purchaser;  the  latter 
does  better,  but  both  during  Holy  Week  are  sublimely  elevated 
above  all  personal  considerations  beyond  raising  their  prices, 
to  swell  the  stream  of  cash  which  is  sure  to  flow  in  to  them, 
like  their  own  golden  Tiber,  in  a  flood.  Above  all  considera¬ 
tions  of  dirt,  punctuality,  or  even  a  sufficiency  of  food,  the 
traveler  must  take  his  meals  at  hotel  or  cafe,  as  he  can  get 
them.  The  table  laid,  there  is  a  rush  of  the  first  comers,  who 
soon  leave  but  a  few  cold  fragments  for  those  whose  intuition 
could  not  tell  them  that  the  table-d’hdte  of  yesterday,  at  the 
fixed  hour  of  seven,  was  to-day  at  four.  The  desperate  mob 
at  cafes  is  amusing.  All  the  world  being  anxious  to  arrive  at 
some  solemn  spectacle  at  the  same  moment,  they  are  all 


258 


ITALIAN  SIGHTS  AND  PAPAL  PRINCIPLES. 


equally  anxious  to  breakfast  in  season.  Pell-mell  they  tum¬ 
ble  into  the  cafes,  demanding  cofiee  and  toast  in  a  dozen  lan¬ 
guages  in  one  breath,  carrying  one  forcibly  back  to  the  first 
breakfast  scene  after  the  polyglot  confusion  at  the  Tower  of 
Babel.  The  waiter  slaps  on  the  table  an  unwiped  cup,  and  a 
napkin  that  has  seen  a  week’s  hard  service.  After  waiting 
in  an  agony  of  impatience,  for  fear  the  Pope  will  bless  the 
faithful  and  you  be  found  not  among  them,  and  no  coffee  in 
sight,  you  angrily  again  summon  the  waiter,  who  comes  when 
he  can.  To  your  emphatic  remonstrance  he  replies,  “  What 
would  you  have,  sir?  it  is  Holy  Week’’ — the  stereotyped  an¬ 
swer  to  every  species  of  annoyance  and  extortion  to  which 
strangers  are  subjected  during  this  most  unholy  of  periods,  and 
with  which  they  must  be  comforted,  for  none  other  will  be 
vouchsafed. 

To  all  the  principal  sights  of  the  Church  there  are  reserved 
seats  or  positions,  for  which  tickets  are  issued  in  the  ratio  of 
about  five  to  one  as  to  accommodation.  These  are  given  to 
the  several  embassadors  in  proportion  to  the  number  of  their 
applications,  which  of  course  greatly  exceed  the  number  of 
tickets  they  receive  for  distribution.  Hence  arises  another 
scramble  for  these  permits  to  witness  the  sacred  mysteries 
within  the  privileged  limits.  Women  are  required  to  go  in 
black  and  veiled  ;  men  in  a  ball  dress  or  uniform.  By  a 
strange  anomaly,  in  all  Catholic  countries,  the  sword  has  the 
preference  of  entry  to  all  temples  of  the  Prince  of  Peace.  To 
return  to  the  tickets.  A  hapless  week  is  the  Holy  Week  for 
the  embassador  or  banker.  He  is  besieged  by  notes,  flattery, 
interest,  and  every  weapon,  feminine  and  masculine,  to  furnish 
the  reqired  billets  of  entry.  How  to  gratify  one,  and  not  irri¬ 
tate  flve  whom  he  can  not  provide  for,  is  a  moral  problem  our 
diplomatic  Solons  and  financial  Rothschilds  are  not  always 
successful  in  solving.  However,  they  do  their  best,  and  dis- 


ITALIAN  SIGHTS  AND  PAPAL  PRINCIPLES. 


259 


tribute  the  papal  tickets,  a  difi’ereiit  color  for  each  day,  as  far 
as  they  will  go. 

Palm  Sunday,  so  called  from  Christ’s  triumphal  entry  into 
Jerusalero,  is  the  first  grand  day  of  the  holy  series.  But  pre¬ 
ceding  this  there  was  formerly  a  stately  cavalcade,  when  popes 
and  cardinals  were  better  riders  tlian  at  present ;  but  as  it  be¬ 
came  necessary  to  tie  some  of  the  “  eminentissimi,”  as  the 
cardinals  are  called,  on  their  steeds,  on  account  of  their  defect¬ 
ive  horsemanship,  and  Pius  VIL,  who  succeeded  the  handsome 
Pius  VL,  being  an  infirm  man,  the  custom  was  changed.  Since 
then,  when  the  procession  passes  into  the  street,  the  huge  pa¬ 
pal  state-coach  is  used,  in  which  the  Pope  follows  the  man 
carrying  the  cross,  mounted  on  a  white  mule,  his  Holiness  the 
meanwhile  scattering  his  blessings  over  the  crowd  by  an  in¬ 
cessant  twirl  of  three  fingers,  reminding  one  of  the  favorite 
Italian  game  of  “morra.”  This  coach,  notwithstanding  its 
color,  was  the  special  object  of  hate  to  the  Red  Republicans 
in  1848,  who  would  have  destroyed  it  had  they  not  had  more 
respect  for  a  sacred  doll  called  “  the  most  holy  baby,”  to  which 
it  was  given  for  its  daily  airings. 

On  Palm  Sunday  the  cardinals  pay  homage  to  his  Holiness 
on  his  throne  by  going  according  to  precedence,  and  bowing 
three  times  before  the  Pope — a  bow  for  each  member  of  the 
Trinity — and  then  kissing  the  border  of  the  cope  which  covers 
his  rijrht  hand.  The  choir  commences  with  the  Hosanna  of 
the  children,  after  which  come  appropriate  prayers  and  chants. 
The  Gospel  finished,  the  second  master  of  ceremonies  gives 
artificial  palm-branches  to  the  sacristan,  deacon,  and  subdea¬ 
con,  who,  kneeling  before  the  pontiff,  hold  them  up  for  his  bless¬ 
ing.  While  the  sign  of  the  cross  is  made  over  them,  a  prayer 
is  offered  that  God  will  bless  all  those  who  will  carry  them 
with  right  sentiments. 

It  would  be  impossible  as  well  as  unprofitable  to  describe 


260 


ITALIAN  SIGHTS  AND  PAPAL  PRINCIPLES 


all  the  etiquette  accompanying  each  religious  ceremony  of  the 
Holy  Week.  The  programme  of  the  procession  for  Easter 
Sunday  will  serve  to  show  the  variety  and  extent  of  the  sacred 
household,  each  member  of  which  has  not  only  his  appropriate 


THE  pope’s  carriage 


ITALIAN  SIGHTS  AND  PAPAL  PRINCIPLES. 


261 


costume,  but  his  specific  amount  of  kissing,  homage,  and  genu¬ 
flexions  to  perform,  or  to  fulfill  some  petty  duty  expressly 
created  to  give  him  something  to  do.  No  little  time,  and  not 
a  few  learned  heads,  are  constantly  employed  to  regulate  the 
numberless  questions  of  duty  and  precedence,  and  all  the  non¬ 
sense  of  bombastic  etiquette  that  naturally  find  growth  in  so 
prolific  a  soil  of  folly  and  absurdity.  Thus  the  Pope  reads  in 
broad  daylight,  by  a  lighted  candle,  some  sacred  lesson  which 
no  one  can  hear. 

The  cardinals  again  pay  homage,  as  each  receives  a  palm 
from  the  Pope,  by  kissing  the  hand  that  gives  it,  the  palm  it¬ 
self,  and  the  right  knee  of  the  holy  father.  After  them,  in 
the  order  of  the  procession,  follow  the  difierent  hierarchal  ranks 
down  to  the  mitred  abbots,  who,  with  all  that  succeed  them, 
kiss  simply  the  pontiff’’s  foot.  Last  of  all  come  the  military, 
and  the  foreigners  of  distinction  at  Rome  who  are  admitted  to 
this  honor,  each  bearing  away  a  palm.  This,  with  the  accom¬ 
panying  service,  takes  up  a  great  deal  of  time,  and  is  a  very 
tiresome  afiair.  The  music  of  the  Pope’s  choir  is  the  best  that 
Italy  can  provide,  and  the  procession,  seen  for  the  first  time  in 
St.  Peter’s  in  all  its  elaborate  pageantry,  is  worth  perhaps  all 
the  squeezing  and  wrangling  for  room  which  it  occasions,  to 
say  nothing  of  the  odors  arising  from  an  unwashed,  uncombed, 
garlic-fed  Roman  peasantry.  Vast  as  is  St.  Peter’s — so  vast 
and  massive  that  the  same  temperature  is  maintained  during 
summer  and  winter — the  smells  arising  from  foul  humanity 
overpower  the  fragrant  fumes  of  the  numberless  censers,  and, 
for  days  after  the  great  festivals,  leave  the  church  in  a  disa¬ 
greeable  condition. 

One  of  the  drollest  sights  of  the  Holy  Week  is  to  see  the 
Cardinal  Grand  Penitentiary  from  his  throne  dispensing  abso¬ 
lution  to  the  crowds  that  flock  to  him.  He  alone  can  absolve 
in  those  cases  which  the  Pope  reserves  to  himself,  besides 


ITALIAN  SIGHTS  AND  PAPAL  PRINCIPLES 


2G2 


granting  dispensation  for  contravention  of  civil  law,  illegiti¬ 
mate  births,  vows,  simony,  and  every  sin  or  error  which,  for 
cause  good  or  bad,  the  Church  takes  upon  herself  to  pardon. 
That  pardon  for  every  crime  has  its  price  is  no  fiction  in  the 
annals  of  Rome  ;  not  that  the  traffic  in  absolution  is  openly 
indulged  or  always  abused,  but  that  it  is  in  some  cases  openlv 
avowed  I  know,  and  sermons  preached  proclaiming  the  de¬ 
testable  doctrine,  and  the  price  attached  to  the  greatest  erimes 


KISSING  THE  pope’s  FOOT. 


ITALIAN  SIGHTS  AND  PAPAL  PRINCIPLES 


2G3 


against  the  law  of  God.  K^uch  a  one  was  heard  by  a  friend 
of  mine  in  iSpain,  in  which  the  tarilFwas  distinctly  laid  down. 
Good  priests  of  every  persuasion  vdll  reprobate  this  evil;  but 
the  Church  of  Horne,  from  which  it  sprung,  still  permits  a 
practice  so  fruitful  in  profit  to  her  treasury.  The  instances  of 
absolution  witnessed  by  myself  bore  a  very  ludicrous  aspect. 
A  large  crowd  surrounded  the  confessional  box  in  which  the 
cardinal  sat.  ISeveral  valets  preserved  order,  and  made  the 


(JHANTING  ABSOLUTION  IN  ST.  PETER’S. 


2G4 


ITALIAN  SIGHTS  AND  PAPAL  PRINCIPLES. 


crowd  approach  and  disappear  as  rapidly  as  possible.  Some 
fi\e  or  six  would  kneel  at  once.  He  touched  in  silence  their 
heads  lightly,  and  as  rapidly  as  one  could  count,  with  the  tip 
of  a  long  brass  rod,  and  the  ceremony  for  them  was  over.  A 
woman  brought  up  two  daughters  of  six  and  four  years  of  age. 
At  first  he  declined  putting  the  rod  to  their  heads  ;  but  the 
children,  who  evidently  had  been  taught  to  consider  that  some 
mysterious  good  was  connected  with  the  operation,  refused  to 
budge.  The  cardinal  at  last  impatiently  gave  the  elder  the 
required  tap  ;  while  the  younger,  who  kept  bowing  and  kneel¬ 
ing,  was  thrust  aside  unabsolved  to  make  way  for  fresh  sin¬ 
ners.  Perhaps  he  considered  her  as  “  one  of  the  little  ones” 
who  need  no  absolution  from  man. 

The  interval  between  Palm  Sunday  and  Wednesday-eve  is 
not  without  its  catalogue  of  sights  to  the  profane  or  pious  who 
are  moved  to  attend.  But  there  are  enough  grand  ceremonies 
to  weary  both  soul  and  body,  without  giving  heed  to  the  lesser 
offices  of  the  Holy  Week.  The  great  rush  is  to  hear  the  three 
Misereres  in  the  Sistine  Chapel.  The  first  is  on  Wednesday. 
The  office  is  called  the  tenehrcs,  or  darkness  ;  though  why,  no 
one  knows.  At  the  “  epistle  side”  of  the  sanctuary  there  is  a 
large  candlestick,  surmounted  by  a  triangle,  on  the  ascending 
sides  of  which  are  stuck  fourteen  yellow  candles,  with  one  at 
the  apex.  There  are  various  conjectures  among  the  Roman 
Catholic  writers  as  to  what  these  mourning  candles  are  intend¬ 
ed  to  typify.  Some  say  the  Apostles  and  the  Three  Maries  ; 
others,  the  patriarchs  and  prophets  ;  but  the  plain  truth  is,  that 
as  no  one  knows  any  thing  about  the  original  meaning  of  the 
ceremony,  any  one  has  the  right  to  conjecture  what  he  pleases. 
These  lights  are  gradually  put  out  during  the  office,  and  this 
extinction  testifies  grief. 

The  uses  of  many  of  the  articles  that  find  such  conspicuous 
positions  in  Roman  Catholic  worship  are  an  enigma  to  the 


ITALIAN  SIGHTS  AND  PAPAL  PRINCIPLES. 


2G5 


most  enlightened  papists  themselves.  They  are  retained  be¬ 
cause  custom  has  made  them  venerable,  and  they  add  to  the 
show.  But  the  reasons  which  ecclesiastical  ingenuity  invents 
to  justify  many  palpable  absurdities  are  quite  worthy  of  the 
era  which  originated  the  learned  discussion  as  to  how  many 
angels  could  dance  at  one  time  on  a  needle’s  point.  For  in¬ 
stance,  the  large  faiis,^a^e/Zi,  made  of  peacocks’  feathers,  which 
were  originally  nothing  but  fly-brushes,  are  now  exalted  into 
monitors  for  the  Pope.  The  brushing  away  of  insects  from 
the  altar  is  considered  as  typical  of  the  “  endeavor  to  banish  the 
distractions  of  idle  thoughts  from  the  mind  of  hun  who  approached 
to  offer  the  holy  sacrifce.  Being  formed  of  peacocks'  feathers^ 
and  even  now,  when  eyes  are  seen  in  the  plumes,  it  admonishes  the 
Pontiff  that  a  general  observation  is  fxed  upon  him,  and  shows 
the  necessity  of  circumspection  in  his  own  conduct." 

My  quotations,  when  not  otherwise  mentioned,  are  from 
Bishop  England’s  “  Explanations  of  the  Ceremonies  of  the 
Holy  Week.”  I  consider  it  necessary  to  mention  this,  lest 
some  of  my  readers,  in  their  simplicity,  should  accuse  me  of 
satirizing  what  I  can  not  commend.  I  go  to  Rome  to  view  the 
Papal  Church,  because  it  is  there,  in  the  city  of  its  choice  and 
power,  that  we  expect  to  find  it  in  its  purest  forms.  I  quote 
its  doctrines  from  its  own  historians  and  clergy,  so  that  my  au¬ 
thorities  shall  be  above  impeachment.  If  either  fact  or  faith 
appear  too  strange  to  be  true,  reader  mine,  make  a  pilgrimage 
of  doubt  to  the  Eternal  City  to  relieve,  through  the  medium  of 
your  own  eyes  and  ears,  a  skepticism  excusable,  it  must  be 
confessed,  but  without  foundation. 

Hours  before  the  commencement  of  the  “  Mattutino  delle 
Tenebre,”  as  the  Italians  call  this  impressive  service,  the  royal 
staircase  of  the  Vatican,  which  leads  toward  the  Sistine  Chap¬ 
el,  is  crowded  with  the  impatient  multitude  of  both  sexes  who 
have  the  right  of  entry.  Until  the  doors  are  opened  they  have 

M 


THE  SISTINE  CHAPEL  DURING  MASS. 


ITALIAN  SIGHTS  AND  PAPAL  PRINCIPLES. 


267 


no  resource  but  to  remain  quiet,  forming  queue,  as  at  the  French 
theatres.  But  the  moment  the  head  of  the  mass  finds  itself  in 
motion,  there  commences  a  rush  and  scene  of  confusion  fright¬ 
ful  to  witness  and  dangerous  to  experience.  If  the  salvation 
of  each  individual  depended  upon  being  first  within  the  chapel, 
greater  and  more  desperate  efforts  nature  could  not  make  to 
win  that  goal.  It  is  no  vulgar  mob  that  writhes,  pushes,  pants, 
and  struggles,  like  a  knot  of  impaled  worms,  within  those  sa¬ 
cred  walls.  There  are  there  the  distinguished  of  all  countries 
— noblemen  and  noble  ladies — the  curious  traveler  and  the 
pious  pilgrim — the  delicate  invalid,  who  would  die  despair¬ 
ingly  without  hearing  those  more  than  mortal  notes ;  and  the 
gallant  soldier,  whose  brilliant  uniform  gives  him  precedence 
over  the  black  veils  of  women  and  the  dress-coats  of  men — all 
push  forward  in  one  selfish  effort  to  secure  the  coveted  posi¬ 
tion  within  those  narrow  precincts.  In  the  melee,  the  stalwart 
Swiss  guards,  that  endeavor  to  control  this  living  torrent  into 
something  like  order  and  respect  for  the  sanctuary,  are  not  un- 
frequently  roughly  borne  b^ack,  and  obliged  to  exert  no  slight 
violence  to  disengage  themselves.  They  are  often  more  rude 
than  necessity  requires,  and  I  have  heard  fierce  words  ex¬ 
changed,  even  during  the  service,  between  them  and  visitors 
whose  tempers  were  not  proof  against  their  insolence  and 
roughness.  In  general,  however,  they  are  assiduous  to  protect 
the  weaker  sex,  and  to  keep  the  two  sexes  as  distinct  as  pos¬ 
sible,  for  the  papal  rule,  like  the  Jewish,  is,  that  they  shall  not 
mingle  during  these  holy  offices.  To  speak  together,  whatever 
may  be  the  necessity,  is  promptly  rebuked  by  the  presiding 
officers.  The  ladies  are  rapidly  hustled  into  their  reserved 
seats.  The  gentlemen  and  the  superfluous  ladies  remain  stand¬ 
ing,  wedged  firmly  together,  in  the  restricted  limits  below  the 
tribune  reserved  for  royal  families  and  embassadors.  I  had 
literally  in  my  arms  a  lovely  English  girl,  who  threatened  every 


268 


ITALIAN  SIGHTS  AND  PAPAL  PRINCIPLES. 


moment  to  faint  from  the  heat  and  pressure,  while,  I  am  quite 
sure,  our  double  weight  was  sustained  in  great  part  by  ladies 
in  our  rear.  JSome  do  faint,  and  it  is  with  the  greatest  diffi¬ 
culty  that  they  are  borne  out.  Dresses  are  torn  and  jewels  lost 
as  a  matter  of  course.  More  serious  accidents  have  occurred 
on  these  occasions.  A  gentleman  had  his  leg  broken,  and  a 
young  girl  was  killed  not  long  since,  or  rather  died  from  the 
effects  of  the  injuries  she  received. 

From  what  I  saw,  I  should  say  that  there  is  no  place  equal 
to  the  h^istine  Chapel  for  testing  what  amount  of  danger,  in¬ 
convenience,  and  even  rudeness,  delicate  females  will  submit 
to  for  the  gratification  of  their  curiosity.  The  excitement 
seems  to  develop  in  them  a  spirit  of  ferocity  toward  each  other 
— of  course,  I  refer  only  to  the  exceptions  to  their  general  ami¬ 
ability — but  the  curious  will  observe  stout  ladies  slyly  making 
their  way  by  sticking  pins  into  those  in  front,  and  slipping  by 
as  they  turn  to  discover  the  aggressor ;  others  seize  hold  of 
gentlemen,  or  make  use  of  them  to  aid  their  progress,  as  if  the 
idea  “  delicacy”  had  become  obsolete  ;  while  one  powerful 
French  girl,  who  wished  the  situation  of  an  Italian  lady  of  my 
acquaintance  in  front  of  her,  abruptly  demanded  it.  Being  re¬ 
spectfully  declined,  she,  by  a  process  well  known  to  school¬ 
boys,  knocked  the  lady’s  legs  from  under  her  by  striking  her 
in  the  hollow  of  her  knees,  so  that  she  fell  as  suddenly  as  if 
she  had  been  shot.  Before  she  could  recover  herself  or  her 
presence  of  mind,  her  place  was  gone. 

The  first  portion  of  the  service  is  the  ordinary  chant,  a  long 
and  drowsy  performance,  including  the  Lamentations  of  Jere¬ 
miah,  severely  trying  the  patience  of  the  standing  spectators. 
As  this  proceeds,  one  by  one  the  candles  are  extinguished,  ex¬ 
cept  that  which  typifies  the  Virgin  Mary,  who  alone  of  the 
household  of  Christ  is  supposed,  in  his  hour  of  trial,  to  have 
retained  her  faith  unshaken.  As  the  day  declines,  the  gloom 


ITALIAN  SIGHTS  AND  PAPAL  PRINCIPLES. 


2G9 


of  the  chapel,  unrelieved  except  by  the  hidden  lights  of  the 
choristers  and  the  soft  rays  of  twilight,  becomes  exceedingly 
impres.sive.  The  faces  of  those  severely-grand  Prophets,  and 
the  speaking  Sibyls  of  Michael  Angelo,  look  down  with  super¬ 
natural  force  from  the  lofty  ceiling,  as  if  from  out  of  the  firma¬ 
ment  of  heaven,  while  high  up  on  the  distant  wall,  amid  the 
shadows  of  evening,  the  awe-struck  spectator  beholds  the  ter¬ 
rible  outline  of  the  avenging  Judge,  hurling  the  damned  to 
endless  woe.  Beneath,  amid  the  fires  of  the  bottomless  pit, 
grinning  devils  savagely  seize  their  prey.  The  Virgin  Mother 
pleads  with  the  stern  Son,  whose  mercy  has  now  turned  to 
justice.  Saints  and  martyrs,  bearing  the  instruments  of  their 
earthly  tortures,  are  arising  from  their  graves,  and  floating  up¬ 
ward  to  the  glory  that  awaits  them.  At  this  hour,  and  with 
such  music  subduing  the  soul  to  breathless  *  silence,  the  Last 
Judgment  stands  forth  as  the  most  awful  triumph  of  earthly 
art.  Human  strength  at  times  faints  beneath  the  emotions 
produced  by  the  combination  of  such  powerful  appeals  to  the 
fears  and  sympathies.  The  chords  of  the  heart  and  imagina¬ 
tion  vibrate  in  unison,  and  many  vainly  struggle  to  suppress 
their  distress  as  the  Miserere  proceeds.  After  pauses  of  si¬ 
lence  which,  like  utter  darkness,  seems  as  if  it  could  be  felt, 
a  hundred  accordant  voices,  as  one,  sue  Heaven  for  pardon  to 
a  guilty  world,  in  strains  such  as  human  ears  might  well  con¬ 
ceive  to  arise  from  penitent  spirits  ;  solitary  voices  of  wonder¬ 
ful  sweetness  and  power,  in  alternate  verses,  continue  the 
lamentation,  all  mingling  in  the  last  passages,  when  the  full 
choir  again  is  faintly  heard  in  notes  that  die  away  like  the  ex¬ 
piring  wail  of  lost  humanity,  but  end  in  one  final  burst  of  cho¬ 
ral  harmony,  which  sends  its  thrill  through  the  very  soul. 

Previous  to  the  Miserere  of  Allegri,  the  Pope  comes  down 
from  his  throne,  and  kneels  while  two  treble  voices  sinof, 
“  Christ  was  made  for  us  obedient  even  unto  death,”  and  the 


270 


ITAJ.IAN  SIGHTS  AND  PAPAL  PRINCIPLES. 


Lord’s  Prayer  is  silently  repeated.  After  the  singing,  the  Pope 
reads  the  closing  prayer,  and  the  service  is  concluded  by  the 
choir’s  imitating  the  confusion  of  nature  at  the  death  of  the 
Redeemer,  and  the  fear  and  grief  of  the  attendant  soldiers  and 
spectators.  The  pathos  of  music  is  now  exhausted ;  neither 
art  nor  sympathy  could  bear  more. 

The  effect  of  this  service  varies,  of  course,  according  to  in¬ 
dividual  temperament.  Many  do  not  consider  it  worthy  of 
the  fatigue  and  exertion  it  requires  ;  but  no  one  would  con¬ 
sider  Rome  as  visited  unless  he  had  heard  the  Miserere  by 
the  Pope’s  choir  in  the  Sistine  Chapel.  It  can  be  heard  in  per¬ 
fection  nowhere  else,  because  there  alone  are  those  wonder¬ 
ful  associations  of  art  that  contribute  so  greatly  to  its  effect. 
There  is  no  accompaniment  to  the  voices. 

Holy  Thursday  is  the  busiest  day  of  the  sacred  seven.  The 
mass  is,  if  possible,  more  tedious  than  usual.  There  are  end¬ 
less  shiftings  of  vestments,  the  yellow  candles  of  the  altar  arc 
changed  for  white,  and  the  ornaments  covered  with  white  in¬ 
stead  of  purple,  as  indicating  a  less  degree  of  mourning.  The 
bells,  and  even  the  clocks,  are  all  tied  up  until  Saturday  noon, 
or  after  the  Resurrection,  which  is  then  announced  by  all  the 
uproar  they  can  make.  The  Pope  blesses  the  incense  which 
is  used  to  perfume  the  altar,  and  then  submits  to  being  in¬ 
censed  himself  by  the  senior  cardinal  priest.  This  is  by  no 
means  a  pleasant  operation,  if  the  incense  be  very  powerful. 

The  officiating  prelates  are  incensed  also  in  their  turn ;  a 
rite  which  strikes  one  as  wholly  pagan  in  its  origin  and  appli¬ 
cation.  The  kissing  of  the  robes  and  toes  goes  on  as  usual, 
but  not  the  kiss  of  peace,  because  it  is  the  anniversary  of  the 
betrayal  of  Judas.  The  Pope,  in  solemn  procession,  bare¬ 
headed,  and  with  incense  burning  before  him,  deposits  the 
body  of  Christ  on  the  altar  in  the  Sistine  Chapel,  which  is 
brilliantly  illuminated  by  six  hundred  wax  candles  for  the  oc- 


ITALIAN  SIGHTS  AND  PAPAL  PRINCIPLES. 


271 


(.asion.  All  kneel  as  he  passes.  Why  the  apparent  burial 
should  precede  the  crucifixion  is  an  anomaly  that  the  Church 
does  not  explain,  except  so  far  as  it  gives  the  faithful  an  op¬ 
portunity  to  worship  the  Holy  Wafer.  The  devotion  now  dis¬ 
played  is  one  of  the  most  impressive  features  of  the  Roman 
Catholic  faith.  No  one  can  enter  this  beautiful  chapel,  and  be¬ 
hold  the  multitudes  kneeling  in  silent  adoration  before  the  sac¬ 
rament,  without  feeling  stirred  within  him  the  spirit  of  devo¬ 
tion.  It  is  no  graven  image  that  they  worship.  They  believe 
that  before  them  lies  the  very  flesh  and  blood  of  their  Savior. 
They  prostrate  themselves  before  their  God.  Protestants  may 
wonder  that  faith  can  be  pushed  to  such  a  degree  ;  but  can 
those  who  thus  believe  do  less  ?  I  am  not  one  of  those  who 
are  surprised  that  the  ignorant  Roman  Catholics  resent  the  in¬ 
difference  and  contempt  that  Protestants  too  often  show  to  the 
Holy  Sacrament.  They  overlook  neglect  of  courtesy  toward 
the  Pope,  and  even  disrespect  to  saints  and  images  ;  but  want 
of  reverence  to  the  body  of  Christ  strikes  them  as  the  unpar¬ 
donable  offense  against  the  Holy  Ghost.  The  doctrine  of 
transubstantiation  is  the  widest  of  all  the  gulfs  between  the 
two  creeds.  Imagine  the  horror  of  the  Italian  landlord  when 
called  upon  for  a  dish  of  pigeons  by  an  Englishman,  who  could 
make  himself  understood  only  by  repeating  the  name  given  to 
the  dove  in  religious  processions,  viz.,  Santo — literal¬ 

ly,  “  a  dish  of  the  Holy  Ghost.” 

As  the  papal  benediction  on  Thursday  extends  only  to  the 
city  gates,  there  is  no  great  crowd  to  receive  it.  A  portion  of 
the  Pope’s  prayer  is  as  follows  :  “We  ask, through  the  prayers 
and  merits  of  the  blessed  Mary,  ever  virgin,  of  the  blessed 
John  the  Baptist,  of  all  the  saints,”  ^c. ;  after  finishing  which, 
he  showers  down  “  plenary”  indulgences  by  the  handful. 

I  have  met  very  few  who  knew  what  an  indulgence  was. 
I  find  the  general  idea  among  Roman  Catholics  to  be  that  the 


272 


ITALIAN  SIGHTS  AND  PAPAL  PRINCIPLES. 


indulgence  of  the  nineteenth  century  means  shortening  their 
time  so  much  in  Purgatory.  Upon  that  principle,  heaven  be¬ 
comes  simply  a  matter  of  bargain  with  the  priesthood  ;  the 
wealthy  realizing,  no  doubt,  with  them  as  much  difficulty  in 
opening  the  door  as  did  the  rich  man  spoken  of  by  our  Savior. 
But  in  the  latter  case  it  was  the  cares  of  the  world  that  stop¬ 
ped  his  progress  ;  in  the  former,  it  is  the  tariff  of  the  Church. 

The  squeeze  to  see  the  washing  of  the  feet  and  feeding 
of  the  pilgrims  is  equal  to  that  to  hear  the  Miserere.  Thir¬ 
teen  priests  are  the  selected  recipients  of  this  act  of  papal  hu¬ 
mility.  They  are  all  dressed  in  loose  white  gowns,  with  caps 
of  the  same  material  on  their  heads.  The  object  of  this  cus¬ 
tom  is  “■  to  give  the  Pontiff  the  opportunity  of  learning  and 
practicing  a  lesson  of  humility.”  The  lesson  of  humility  is 
studied  in  the  following  manner.  A  throne  for  the  Pope  is 
first  placed  in  the  hall,  with  the  usual  tokens  of  sovereign 
rank.  A  large  retinue  of  nobles  and  ecclesiastics  assist  his 
Holiness.  Two  hold  the  Pope’s  train,  a  third  bears  a  towel 
for  washing  his  hands,  while  two  clerks  of  the  chamber  aid 
him  in  his  own  ablutions,  after  his  labors  on  the  pilgrims. 
The  pilgrims,  alias  priests,  are  seated  on  a  high  bench.  The 
right  foot,  having  been  previously  made  most  scrupulously 
clean,  is  left  bare.  The  Pope  changes  his  uniform  for  a  less 
splendid  one,  and,  after  being  duly  incensed,  a  fine  cloth, 
trimmed  with  lace,  is  tied  upon  him.  Attended  by  his  mas¬ 
ter  of  ceremonies  and  deacons,  he  humbly  proceeds  to  the 
washing.  A  sub-deacon  lifts  the  foot ;  the  Pontiffkneels,  and 
sprinkles  it  with  water  from  a  silver  basin.  He  then  rubs  it 
with  the  laced  cloth,  kisses  it,  and  goes  on  to  the  next.  A 
nosegay  and  towel,  and  a  gold  and  silver  medal,  are  given  to 
each  pilgrim.  This  lesson  of  humility  lasts  about  two  min¬ 
utes. 

Another  rush,  and  the  crowd  find  themselves  Avithin  the 


ITALIAN  SIGHTS  AND  PAPAL  PRINCIPLES 


273 


“  Salla  della  Tavola”  where  the  pilgrims  are  fed.  The  Pope 
puts  on  an  apron,  pours  water  on  his  hands,  hurriedly  hands 
the  pilgrims  a  few  dishes,  which  are  presented  to  him  by 


t 

J 


THE  pilgrims’  dinner. 


kneeling  prelates,  blesses  them,  and  retires.  Thus  ends  les¬ 
son  two  of  humility.  The  dinner  is  a  good  one,  and  all  that 

2 


274 


ITALIAN  SIGHTS  AND  PAPAL  PRINCIPLES. 


the  pilgrims  can  not  eat  they  carry  away.  When  the  Pope 
does  not  feel  in  the  mood  for  the  latter  ceremony,  he  delegates 
it  to  a  substitute. 

The  exhibition  of  the  Cross  of  Fire,  suspended  above  the 
tomb  of  St.  Peter,  around  which  burn  night  and  day  two  hund¬ 
red  silver  lamps,  has  been  discontinued  for  upward  of  twenty 
years,  owing  to  the  scandalous  scenes  which  took  place  among 
the  crowd  in  the  church,  after  its  adoration  by  the  Pope  and 
crowned  heads  then  at  Rome. 

On  Good  Friday  the  papal  chapel  presents  its  deepest  tone 
of  grief.  It  is  stripped  bare  of  carpets  and  ornaments.  The 
cardinals  wear  purple  stockings,  and  leave  their  rings  behind 
them.  The  lessons  are  appropriate  to  the  day  ;  but  the  satis¬ 
faction  which  would  otherwise  arise  in  the  heart  at  hearing 
the  offices  is  wholly  lost  in  the  tedium  and  disgust  attendant 
upon  the  insipid  ceremonies  which  accompany  them.  For¬ 
merly,  the  clergy  came  barefooted ;  now,  only  the  Pope  and 
some  of  the  superior  clergy  and  cardinals  take  off  their  shoes 
during  the  Adoration  of  the  Cross,  from  which  the  violet  cov¬ 
ering  is  removed.  The  Pope  casts  his  offering,  a  purse  of  red 
damask  trimmed  with  gold,  into  a  silver  basin.  Then  there 
is  a  procession  to  and  from  the  Pauline  Chapel.  But  the  chief 
attractions  on  this  day  are  the  music  and  sermons  at  the  sev¬ 
eral  churches,  which  rival  each  other  in  their  preparations  for 
the  Tre  Ore,  the  three  hours  of  agony  of  Christ  upon  the 
cross,  lasting  from  twelve  to  three.  This  is  a  religious  drama, 
and,  when  not  exaggerated,  by  the  action  and  grimaces  of  the 
preachers,  and  the  tawdry  scenery  of  the  churches  to  represent 
Calvary,  into  a  burlesque,  is  solemn  and  impressive. 

The  service  of  the  Tre  Ore  is  divided  into  seven  acts,  found¬ 
ed  upon  the  seven  supposed  speeches  of  Christ  upon  the  cross, 
at  each  one  of  which  the  Roman  Catholics  believe  that  a  dag¬ 
ger  entered  the  heart  of  his  mother.  She  is  called,  on  that 


PKMTliNrs  ON  fiOOD  Pn!T)AV, 


276 


ITALIAN  SIGHTS  AND  PAPAL  PRINCIPLES 


account,  “  Our  Lady  of  the  Seven  Sorrows,”  and  painted,  as 
is  often  seen  in  churches  and  shrines,  with  a  bloody  heart  on 
her  breast,  with  seven  daggers  stuck  around  it. 

The  preacher  I  heard  was  a  Jesuit,  at  the  church  of  that 
order,  the  most  gaudily  decorated  and  richest  in  Rome.  His 
sermon  was  decidedly  dramatic,  both  in  language  and  acces¬ 
sories,  but  much  less  so  than  one  might  expect  from  the  Ro- 


A  nOMAN  PUEACHER 


ITALIAN  SIGHTS  AND  PAPAL  PRINCIPLES. 


277 


man  taste.  The  style  and  arguments  were  admirably  calcu¬ 
lated  to  arouse  the  languid  devotion  of  his  flock,  who  appeared 
fully  impressed  with  the  solemn  event  they  had  assembled  to 
commemorate.  This  immense  church  was  crowded  with  wor¬ 
shipers. 

In  the  evening  I  drove  to  the  Hospital  of  the  Trinitd  de 
Pellegrine,  to  witness  the  washing  of  the  feet  and  feeding  of 
pilgrims  by  the  nobles  of  Rome.  This  immense  building  has 
accommodation  for  five  thousand  pilgrims,  who  are  here  gra¬ 
tuitously  fed  and  lodged  for  three  days  during  Holy  Week. 
The  washing  and  feeding  here  was  no  farce,  whatever  may 
have  been  the  motives  that  induced  these  acts  of  humility. 
Roman  gentlemen  and  nobles,  in  the  garb  of  domestics,  wash¬ 
ed  and  waited  upon  these  dirtiest  of  all  mortals  with  the  ut¬ 
most  zeal  and  apparent  cheerfulness — the  bounty  being,  as  I 
was  informed,  so  many  days’  indulgence  to  each. 

In  the  female  wards,  I  was  told  by  the  ladies  that  they  saw 
some  of  the  fairest  and  noblest  of  Rome’s  aristocracy  on  their 
knees,  scrubbing  away  at  feet  that  had  needed  ablution  for 
many  weeks  previous.  At  supper  they  attended  them  as  hum¬ 
bly  as  if  they  had  been  bred  to  serve,  and  even  the  loveliest 
among  them  took  the  filthy  babies  from  their  mothers’  arms, 
and  nursed  them  as  tenderly  as  they  would  have  nursed  their 
own,  while  their  hungry  mothers  ate. 

On  this  evening  there  is  a  performance  at  some  of  the 
churches  of  another  m.anner  of  mortifying  the  flesh.  This  is 
the  self-flagellation  of  penitents,  who  are  clad  in  vestments  of 
coarse  dark  cloth,  which  completely  disguises  them,  leaving 
only  holes  for  their  eyes.  After  an  exhortation  from  a  friar, 
the  lights  are  extinguished  and  scourges  distributed.  Of 
course,  it  is  impossible  to  tell  how  far  the  ceremony  is  a  farce 
or  penance.  At  all  events,  the  scourging  and  wailing  sound 
like  earnest,  while  the  dismal  chanting  of  the  monks  does  not 


278 


ITALIAN  SIGHTS  AND  PAPAL  PRINCIPLES. 


tend  to  enliven  the  scene,  which  lasts  about  half  an  hour,  when 
all  depart  with  the  satisfaction  of  having  performed  a  merito¬ 
rious  action. 

The  ceremonies  of  Saturday  attract  the  attention  of  few  be¬ 
sides  the  actors.  They  are  numerous,  however,  and,  as  a  mat¬ 
ter  of  curiosity,  to  see  how  far  the  Church  of  Rome  carries  its 
typical  mysteries,  worth  noticing.  The  converted  Jews,  if  any 
— Turks  are  considered  a  greater  glory — are  baptized  early  in 
the  morning  at  St.John  in  Lateran.  After  this,  an  ordination 
of  priests,  in  which  several  long  hours  are  occupied  in  rites 
sufficiently  puerile  and  wearisome  to  make  one  doubt  the  san¬ 
ity  of  the  performers.  At  the  Sistine  Chapel  we  have  the 
blessing  of  the  fire  and  incense,  and  the  blessing  of  the  paschal 
candle,  by  a  deacon  dressed  in  white,  to  represent  the  angel 
announcing  the  resurrection.  This  candle  is  of  immense  size, 
and  pierced  with  five  holes  in  the  form  of  a  cross,  to  represent 
the  five  principal  wounds  of  our  Saviour.  Five  grains  of  in¬ 
cense  are  placed  in  these  holes,  as  emblematic  of  embalming. 
At  this  season,  too,  there  is  a  general  blessing  and  sprinkling 
of  holy  water  in  private  houses  by  priests,  who  gratefully  re¬ 
ceive  the  current  coin  of  the  realm  in  return  for  their  effica¬ 
cious  benedictions.  Even  the  brutes  come  in  for  a  share  of 
this  pious  labor,  but  this  is  somewhat  later,  on  the  anniversary 
of  their  guardian  Saint  Anthony.  After  each  sprinkling  from 
the  sacred  brush,  the  priest  repeats  in  Latin,  “  By  the  inter¬ 
cession  of  the  blessed  Anthony,  these  animals  are  delivered 
from  evil,  in  the  name  of  the  Father,  Son,  and  Holy  Ghost. 
Amen!” 

Easter  Sunday  is  the  grandest  festival  of  the  year.  To  cel¬ 
ebrate  the  Resurrection,  the  Roman  Church  puts  on  all  her 
pomp  and  pageantry.  The  Pope  performs  high  mass  at  St. 
Peter’s.  This  occurs  but  on  two  other  festivals  during  the 
year,  viz.,  Christmas,  and  St.  Peter’s  and  St.  Paul’s  day.  The 


ITALIAN  SIGHTS  AND  PAPAL  PRINCIPLES 


279 


order  and  magnitude  of  the  procession.  I  have  already  g-iven. 
Those  who  have  seen  it  have  beheld  the  accumulated  mag¬ 
nificence  and  solemnity  of  the  Roman  Catholic  ritual.  The 
courtly  splendor  of  all  other  earthly  sovereigns  pales  before 
the  dazzling  display  of  the  wealth  and  magnificence  of  the 
successor  of  the  poor  fisherman  of  Judea.  As  soon  as  the 


280 


ITALIAN  SIGHTS  AND  PAPAL  PRINCIPLES. 


Pope  appears,  borne  upon  the  shoulders  of  his  throne-carriers, 
the  choristers  intone,  in  Latin,  “  Thou  art  Peter,  and  upon  this 
rock  I  build  my  Church,  and  the  gates  of  Hell  shall  not  pre 
vail  against  it.”  The  deep-toned  bells  chime  in  with  their 
welcome.  In  the  church  are  drawn  up  the  grenadiers,  national 
guards,  and  soldiers  of  the  capital,  whose  bands  swell  the  notes 
of  gratulation  to  the  self-styled  representative  of  the  Apostle, 
and  Christ’s  Vicar  on  Earth.  For  those  who  admit  the  title, 
this  homage  is  appropriate  ;  but  to  those  whose  ideas  of  relig¬ 
ion  are  based  on  the  humility  and  spirituality  of  the  true 
Christian  character,  and  the  equality  of  men  before  God,  this 
ostentation  appears  strangely  anomalous. 

One  ceremony  occurs  during  this  mass  which  attests  strong¬ 
ly  the  former  depravity  and  present  fears  of  the  Roman  court. 
The  greatest  caution  is  used  to  prevent  the  Holy  Father  from 
being  poisoned  while  he  partakes  of  the  sacrament.  The  sacred 
vessels  are  carried  to  a  credence-table,  called  the  Pope’s,  on 
the  Gospel  side  of  the  altar.  During  the  chanting  of  the  creed, 
the  vessels  are  taken  there  and  carefully  washed.  The  keeper 
of  the  cellar  first  drinks  some  of  the  wine  and  Water  brought 
for  this  ablution.  When  the  Pope  goes  to  the  altar  to  partake 
of  the  body  and  blood  of  Christ,  the  saeristan  eats  in  his  pres¬ 
ence  a  portion  of  the  bread  provided,  and  tastes  the  wine,  after 
which  the  Pope  does  not  hesitate  to  follow  his  example.  How 
strange  a  comment  upon  the  doctrine  of  transubstantiation,  to 
believe  that  poison  and  the  actual  presence  of  Divinity  can  co¬ 
exist  in  the  same  substances  ! 

Two  junior  cardinal  deacons  stand  on  each  side  of  the  altar, 
representing  the  angels  who  were  at  the  sepulchre.  During 
the  service  fingers  of  the' Pope  diXQ  purified  with  much  cer¬ 
emony,  and  when  the  mitre  is  placed  on  his  head  his  entire 
hands  are  washed.  He  then  goes  to  the  altar  and  concludes 
the  mass. 


ITALIAN  SIGHTS  AND  PAPAL  PRINCIPLES.  281 


No  sooner  is  mass  finished  than  the  immense  multitude 
pours  out  of  St.  Peter’s  into  the  piazza  in  front,  where  the  mil¬ 


itary  are  all  drawn  up,  to  witness  the  ceremony  of  the  bene¬ 
diction.  This  time  it  is  said  to  extend  over  the  entire  world. 
On  this  occasion  the  whole  French  garrison  were  under  arms, 
besides  the  Roman  troops.  The  two  made  a  fine  military  show, 
and  to  my  eye  furnished  the  greater  proportion  of  the  specta- 


ST.  PETER’S, 


282 


ITALIAN  SIGHTS  AND  PAPAL  PRINCIPLES. 


tors.  Even  the  contadini,  the  country  subjects  of  the  Pope, 
who  are  in  general  devoted,  if  not  to  the  Pope,  to  the  ceremo¬ 
nies  of  the  Church,  did  not  appear  in  their  usual  numbers. 
There  were  English  and  other  foreigners  by  thousands.  All 
gazed  anxiously  up  to  the  balcony,  where  the  Holy  Father  was 
to  appear.  After  considerable  delay  he  made  his  appearance, 
and  in  an  audible  prayer  invoked  the  usual  blessing.  The 
soldiers  knelt,  in  obedience  to  the  order  of  their  superiors. 
What  must  have  been  the  feelings  of  those  disciplined  repub¬ 
licans  of  skeptical  France,  thus  humiliated  before  an  old  man 
whose  very  existence  in  Rome  was  owing  to  their  arms,  it  is 
easy  to  conceive.  I  noticed  that  very  few  of  the  Romans  knelt, 
and  many  seemed  careless  about  uncovering  their  heads.  The 
ceremony  had  evidently  outlived  its  spirit,  or  else  Pius  IX.  was 
unloved  in  his  own  capital. 

The  illumination  of  St.  Peter’s  and  the  fireworks  have  been 

too  often  described  to  require  farther  allusion.  They  are  the 

terminating  and  most  agreeable  of  the  spectacles  of  the  Holy 

Week.  St.  Peter’s  shines  out  from  the  surrounding  darkness 
/ 

a  colossal  beacon  of  light ;  thousands  of  globes  and  stars  mark 
its  giant  outline  in  vivid  brightness,  while  high  above  all  rises 
the  illuminated  cross,  piercing  wdth  its  bright  rays  the  dark 
shadows  of  night.  Were  the  heads  of  the  Roman  Church  thus 
to  illumine  the  moral  darkness  of  the  world,  she  should  re¬ 
main  for  all  time  as  conspicuous  for  her  piety  as  St.  Peter’s 
appears  from  artificial  splendor.  While  thinking  thus,  as  I 
gazed  on  the  beautiful  spectacle,  a  bright  star  came  twinkling 
out  of  the,  cloudy  obscurity,  and  took  its  place  high  and  serene 
in  the  firmament,  shedding  its  soft  and  lucid  light  in  steady 
rays  through  the  heavens.  This  was  now,  as  in  the  infancy 
of  Christianity,  its  true  emblem.  How  utterly  insignificant 
the  borrowed  brilliancy  of  the  church  appeared  beside  this 
single  star !  Could  we  see  the  nightly  beauties  of  the  uni- 


ITATJAN  SIGHTS  AND  PAPAL  PRINCIPLES. 


283 


verse,  which  Providence  has  made  as  free  to  the  eye  as  air 
to  the  lungs,  rarely  as  man  exhibits  his  counterfeit  glories,  we 
should  turn  in  disgust  from  their  puny  attractions,  to  wonder 
and  worship  at  the  greatness  and  goodness  of  the  Author  of  so 
celestial  a  vision.  But  we  gaze  in  rapture  on  our  own  pigmy 
efforts,  and  coldly  look  upon  the  marvels  of  nature  as  the  mere 
truisms  of  physics. 

I  am  not  at  all  disposed  to  find  fault  with  the  Roman  gov¬ 
ernment  for  celebrating  after  this  manner — I  allude  to  the  fire¬ 
works  and  illumination — the  resurrection  of  our  Savior.  A 
Christian  government  does  wisely  to  exalt  its  Author,  and  cel¬ 
ebrate  his  mission  with  all  possible  magnificence.  It  keeps 
alive  the  principles  of  its  origin,  and  periodically  recalls  to 
public  mind  the  memory  of  events  unequaled  in  their  conse¬ 
quences  by  any  others  in  the  history  of  the  human  race.  In 
this  respect,  therefore,  I  think  the  Roman  Church  wise  ;  but 
in  most  others  connected  with  the  Holy  Week  I  consider  her  as 
degrading  mankind  and  violating  the  very  principles  to  which 
she  falsely  appeals  for  sanction.  As  yet  we  are  only  upon  the 
threshold  of  her  profitless  mummeries.  I  shall  barely  open 
the  door  to  a  few  of  the  principal  falsities  with  which  she  de¬ 
ludes  the  world,  and  leave  my  readers,  who  may  difler  from 
me  in  sentiment,  to  explore  farther,  if  they  will,  for  their  own 
edification. 


CHAPTER  X. 


THE  HOLY  WEEK  AT  ROME. - MACHINERY  AND  MIRACLES  OF 

PAPACY. 

• 

The  ceremonies  and  labors  "of  the  Holy  Week,  one  would 
suppose,  were  sufficient  for  the  wants  of  any  clergy  for  the  en¬ 
tire  year.  Not  so  with  the  Roman  Church.  She  proclaims 
and  enforces  the  observance  of  some  seventy  distinct or 
sacred  days,  besides  Sundays.  Nearly  a  third  of  the  year  is 
consecrated  to  idleness,  which  vice  is  exalted  to  the  rank  of  a 
virtue.  I  would  exempt  from  this  waste  of  time  the  periods 
properly  belonging  to  divine  worship,  which,  .of  course,  are 
comprised  within  the  duties  of  all  men.  But  the  Pope  abso¬ 
lutely  inculcates  doing  nothing  on  holidays,  and  denounces 
heavy  penalties  on  the  disobedient.  The  laboring  classes, 
consequently,  whose  average  daily  gains  are  between  a  quar¬ 
ter  and  a  half  of  a  dollar,  are  compelled  to  abstain  from  all 
work,  and  take  part  in  religious  processions,  or  in  witnessing 
superstitious  rites  of  a  character  to  confirm  their  own  predi¬ 
lections.  Without  the  physical  labors  which  these  holidays 
force  upon  the  clergy,  they  would  be  almost  as  idle  as  the  pop¬ 
ulace  themselves.  But  the  dressings  and  undressings,  the  ge¬ 
nuflexions,  and  swinging  of  censers,  the  marching  and  counter¬ 
marching,  the  collection  of  alms,  bearing  of  images,  carrying 
of  candles,  ringing  of  bells,  and  all  the  complicated  and  ingen¬ 
ious  inventions  of  ecclesiastical  brains  to  keep  their  hands 
from  being  in  the  service  of  the  devil — all  these  find  the  cler¬ 
gy  in  some  degree  of  employment,  while  their  flocks  are  left 
to  idly  gape  over  their  stereotyped  displays,  or  find  such 


ITALIAN  SIGHTS  AND  PAPAL  PRINCIPLES. 


285 


amusements  as  they  can  ;  in  short,  to  do  any  thing  but  con¬ 
form  to  the  divine  injunction,  “  Six  days  shalt  thou  labor.” 
The  Church,  however,  discountenances  irregular  pleasures,  and 
does  its  best,  consistently  with  its  own  example,  to  keep  the 
people  in  a  moral  vein.  It  endeavors  to  reconcile  idleness 
with  goodness,  and  superstition  with  religion  ;  unions,  like  all 
unnatural  ones,  prolific  only  in  imbecility  and  disorder. 


286 


ITALIAN  SIGHTS  AND  PAPAL  PRINCIPLES. 


The  weightiest  objection  to  the  absurd  spectacles  of  the 
Church,  sanctioned  by  the  Pope  and  high  clergy,  is,  that  they 
cultivate  credulity  and  ignorance  among  the  people,  and  teach 
them  to  rely  more  upon  the  blessings  and  supernatural  care 
of  deceased  saints  than  upon  their  own  exertions  or  enterprise 
in  providing  against  the  ordinary  contingencies  of  life.  Hence 
human  prudence  is  superseded  by  a  puerile  fatalism,  equally 
remote  from  the  dignified  practice  and  sublime  doctrine  of 
Islamism.  The  Roman  people,  in  particular,  believe  that  the 
special  business  of  the  saints  in  Paradise  is  to  watch  over 
their  daily  occupations,  and  to  interest  themselves  in  the  suc¬ 
cess  of  all  their  pursuits,  good,  bad,  or  indifierent.  When  an 
accident  occurs  to  man,  beast,  or  vehicle,  they  do  not  hesitate 
to  rate  their  patron  saint  roundly  and  profanely  for  his  negli¬ 
gence.  If,  on  the  •  contrary,  they  escape  an  evil,  they  hasten 
to  offer  a  candle,  or  some  gift  in  proportion  to  their  means,  to 
his  or  her  shrine,  as  the  sex  may  be. 

Among  the  many  ceremonies  my  curiosity  has  prompted  me 
to  witness,  none  more  wearisome  ever  fell  to  my  lot  than  the 
midnight  mass  of  Christmas  eve.  Prompted  by  the  expecta¬ 
tion  of  good  music,  I  went  to  the  church  of  the  “  Annunciata” 
at  Florence,  at  the  usual  hour,  about  ten  o’clock.  The  body 
of  the  church  was  crammed  with  the  unwashed  multitude. 
Behind  the  choir  were  admitted  the  strangers  and  fashiona¬ 
bles.  During  the  dark  and  dismal  service,  gay  conversation, 
flirting,  and  promenading  were  going  on.  It  was  more  like 
the  saloon  of  a  theatre  than  the  house  of  God.  At  midnight 
a  gaudily-dressed  doll  was  held  up  for  the  devotion  of  the 
congregation,  and  the  ceremony  was  concluded. 

The  Roman  clergy  assemble  five  times  a  year  in  general 
processions.  The  different  orders  of  monks,  being  very  prop¬ 
erly  of  the  least  consideration  in  the  Church,  march  first. 
Thirty-seven  communities  appear  under  the  banners  of  their 


ITALIAN  SIGHTS  AND  PAPAL  PRINCIPLES.  287 


A  KOMAN  PROCESSION. 


several  saints,  twenty  march  under  the  flag  of  the  Holy  Sacra¬ 
ment,  and  eight  others  appear  under  different  ensigns,  of  which 
one  is  the  banner  of  Death.  They  turn  out  to  the  number  of 
five  or  six  thousand,  when  in  full  ranks,  of  priests,  monks,  and 
clerks. 


•v  A-S. 


288 


ITALIAN  SIGHTS  AND  PAPAL  PRINCIPLES 


The  most  splendid  of  these  j^rocessions  is  that  of  “  Corpus 
Domini,”  or  the  Fete  of  God.  In  this,  the  Pope  and  all  the 
civil  and  ecclesiastical  dignitaries  of  Rome,  and  the  military, 
take  part.  Embassadors,  governors,  senators,  princes,  and  no¬ 
bles  of  every  degree,  humbly  carrying  candles,  appear  in  this 


PROCESSION  OF  CORPUS  DOMINL 


ITALIAN  SIGHTS  AND  PAPAL  PRINCIPLES. 


289 


colossal  cortege.  The  pope  is  borne  on  his  pontifical  litter, 
high  above  the  heads  of  all,  surrounded  by  his  court,  and  car¬ 
rying  in  his  hands  the  holy  sacrament,  in  vessels  radiant  with 
gold  and  jewels,  before  which  the  spectators  prostrate  them¬ 
selves  humbly  and  uncovered,  as  the  procession  slowly  passes 
through  the  different  quarters  of  Rome,  on  its  way  to  and  from 
St.  Peter’s. 

The  doctrine  and  abuses  of  relics  are  among  the  worst  cor¬ 
ruptions  of  the  Roman  Church.  As  they  are  sources  of  incal¬ 
culable  pecuniary  profit,  they  will  be  among  the  slowest  and 
most  difficult  of  reformation.  Doubtless  the  Church  of  Rome 
possesses,  among  its  hordes  of  false  relics,  some  true  memori¬ 
als  of  departed  saints.  It  is  even  possible,  though  not  proba¬ 
ble,  that  St.  Helena  did  put  her  in  possession  of  some  of  the 
genuine  implements  used  at  the  crucifixion.  Grant  this  much, 
even,  but  hold  her  to  her  own  doctrine  in  regard  to  them,  viz., 
“  That  in  religion  relics  are  to  he  held  in  veneration  corresponding 
to  that  in  which  tokens  of  affection  and  memorials  of  endearment 
are  preserved  in  well-regulated  and  virtuous  families.^’’  This  is 
right  and  proper. 

But  what  use  does  the  Church  of  Rome  make  of  them  ? 
That  she  considers  them  of  primary  importance  in  her  service 
is  evident  from  the  fact  that  she  constitutes  a  congresration  of 
relics,  composed  of  six  cardinals  and  four  prelates,  whose  func¬ 
tions  are  to  examine  and  classify  the  remains  of  ancient  mar¬ 
tyrs  found  in  the  catacombs  of  Rome  and  elsewhere.  Their 
quarry  is  a  large  one,  for  already  there  have  been  taken  from 
this  necropolis  the  remains  of  one  hundred  and  seventy  thou¬ 
sand  victims — of  death  surely,  if  not  of  martyrdom — most  of 
which  have  passed  muster  as  genuine  relics,  comforting  to  the 
faith  of  the  living  and  profitable  to  the  treasury  of  the  Church. 
Unfortunately,  the  science  of  the  priestly  inspectors  has  not  al¬ 
ways  been  equal  to  their  zeal,  and  the  remains  of  animals  have 

N 


290 


ITALIAN  SIGHTS  AND  PAPAL  PRINCIPLES. 


been  sometimes  confounded  with  those  of  the  early  Christians. 
But,  as  a  close  inspection  of  relics  is  seldom  allowed,  distance 
would  lend  as  much  spiritual  efficacy  to  the  bone  of  an  ass  as 
of  a  martyr,  provided  faith  was  equal  to  the  sacred  recognition. 

St.  Peter’s  boasts  the  possession  of  the  most  precious  of  the 
sacred  relics.  These  consist  of  a  piece  of  the  true  cross,  a  por¬ 
tion  of  the  spear-head  which  pierced  the  side  of  Christ,  a  bit 
of  the  sponge,  and  the  true  imprint  of  the  Savior’s  face  upon 
the  handkerchief  of  St.Yeronica,  which,  according  to  Roman 
Catholic  tradition,  she  lent  to  Christ  to  wipe  the  sweat  from 
his  brow  while  staggering  under  the  weight  of  the  cross.  No 
good  Catholic  presumes  to  doubt  the  authenticity  of  these  rel¬ 
ics.  They  are  exhibited  to  the  people  during  Holy  Week,  all 
incased  in  gold  and  j)recious  stones,  from  one  of  the  raised  gal¬ 
leries  above  the  tomb-  of  St.  Peter,  nearly  one  hundred  feet 
above  their  heads,  at  which  distance  it  is  impossible  to  distin¬ 
guish  one  object  from  another.  Besides  these,  there  are  eleven 
columns  from  the  temple  of  Jerusalem,  and  the  one  against 
which  Jesus  leaned,  when  disputing  with  the  doctors.  This 
is  carefully  concealed  from  general  sight  in  one  of  the  chapels, 
but  I  contrived  to  get  in  and  lean  against  the  same  spot — I 
must  confess  it,  not  without  experiencing  a  sensation  of  pious 
gratification  altogether  remote  from  skepticism — so  far  as  the 
iron  grating  with  which  it  is  jealously  encircled  would  permit. 

St.  Peter’s  has  also  a  chapel  specially  devoted  to  the  arms, 
legs,  fingers,  heads,  and  other  portions  of  saints,  the  list  of 
which  hangs  on  the  outside,  and  is  not  a  very  attractive  invi¬ 
tation  to'  enter  to  sensitive  stomachs. 

There  is  scarcely  a  Roman  Catholic  Church  in  Europe  that 
does  not  possess  a  Golgotha  of  relics — disgusting  objects,  most¬ 
ly  defeating  their  own  claims  to  authenticity  by  their  impossi¬ 
ble  pretensions  and  absurd  traditions,  the  belief  in  which  is 
far  more  diligently  inculcated  than  in  the  saving  doctrines  of 


ITALIAN  SIGHTS  AND  PAPAL  PRINCIPLES 


291 


ADORATION  OF  RELICS. 


Scripture.  The  latter  would  put  an  end  to  these  stupid  im¬ 
postures,  but  the  former  exalt  the  reputation  of  the  several 
churches,  and  bring  much  treasure  into  their  coffers.  In  fact, 
they  are  ecclesiastical  museums,  for  which  heretics  pay  to  grat¬ 
ify  their  curiosity,  and  the  faithful  to  adore,  and  gain  the  prom¬ 
ised  indulgences  at  the  expense  of  their  gifts  left  upon  the  al- 


292 


ITALIAN  SIGHTS  AND  PAPAL  PRINCIPLES. 


tars.  I  have  seen  thousands  flock  around  a  miserable  old 
Byzantine  painting  of  the  Virgin,  of  the  twelfth  century,  scru¬ 
pulously  veiled  in  order  to  increase  the  mystery,  except  on  cer- 
I  tain  holidays,  when  the  public  are  admitted  to  kiss  the  silver 
railing  of  the  altar  for  the  purpose  of  devoutly  leaving  a  sum 
of  money  with  the  priest  for  the  edifying  privilege.  Ghastly 
heads  and  remains  of  martyrs,  in  silver  or  gold  cases,  are  peri¬ 
odically  exposed  to  sim.ilar  adoration  in  the  principal  churches, 
or  brought  out  in  solemn  procession  on  the  occasion  of  drought 
or  some  public  calamity,  to  induce  the  defunct  possessor  to  in¬ 
tercede  with  God,  or  more  generally  the  Virgin  Mary,  to  arrest 
the  evil.  Who  can  view  these  imbecilities,  and  not  hold  the 
K/oraan  clergy  accountable  for  withholding  the  bread  of  life, 
and  substituting  pageantry  and  superstitions  not  one  whit  su¬ 
perior  to  the  classical  paganism  they  supplanted  ?  It  is  true 
that  the  early  popes,  despairing  to  abolish  altogether  the 
heathen  customs  of  Rome,  ingrafted  many  of  the  ceremonies 
of  the  expiring  ritual  into  their  own.  But  their  successors 
have  allowed  fifteen  centuries  to  pass  without  a  single  en¬ 
deavor  to  purify  their  religion  from  the  corrupting  influences 
which  their  predecessors  deplored,  and  submitted  to  only  from 
unavoidable  necessity.  Forms  and  names  have  been  changed, 
but  Rome  of  the  nineteenth  century,  under  a  Christian  pontiff 
and  a  learned  clergy,  in  point  of  superstition  and  credulity,  is 
as  essentially  pagan  as  in  the  days  of  Augustus.  The  mira¬ 
cles  of  ancient  Rome,  so  prolific  in  the  pages  of  Livy,  are  every 
whit  as  credible  as  those  which  figure  in  the  annals  of  the 
Church.  When  devotion  flags,  or  money  fails  to  pour  abund¬ 
antly  in  at  a  certain  shrine,  a  miracle  is  sure  to  ensue.  Cu¬ 
riosity  is  excited,  superstition  stimulated,  and  the  needed  ex¬ 
citement  produced.  My  readers  will,  I  trust,  agree  with  me, 
when  they  have  visited  a  few  of  these  idolatrous  shrines,  that 
the  sooner  they  are  swept  from  the  earth,  the  better  will  be¬ 
come  the  temporal  and  eternal  prospects  of  mankind. 


ITALIAN  SIGHTS  AND  PAPAL  PRINCIPLES 


293 


Ill  the  church  of  the  “Ara  Cceli,”  which  occupies  the  site 
of  the  temple  of  the  Capitoline  Jupiter,  there  is  preserved  a 
wretchedly-carved  wooden  doll,  loaded  with  an  incalculable 
amount  of  precious  jewels.  This  doll  belongs  to  the  monks, 
and  brings  them  in  yearly  a  revenue  which  enriches  them  all. 
It  is  called  the  “  Most  Holy  Baby,”  and  the  most  diligent  ex¬ 
ertions  are  made  to  keep  alive  faith  in  its  sovereign  virtues. 


THE  MOST  HOLY  BABY 


294 


ITALIAN  SIGHTS  AND  PAPAL  PRINCIPLES. 


Every  stranger  visits  it,  as  a  matter  of  course,  and  pays  the 
accustomed  fee  ;  but  its  chief  revenue  is  from  the  sick.  It 
has  a  larger  practice  than  any  physician  in  R-ome.  As  soon 
as  a  Roman  despairs  of  his  life  or  his  doctor,  he  sends  for  the 
“  Most  Holy  Baby,”  which  is  brought  in  great  state.  If  he 
die,  the  baby  has  called  him,  which  is  right;  if  he  get  well, 
the  baby  has  cured  him,  which  is  right  also.  In  either  case 
the  monks  receive  their  fee.  It  is  so  rich  that  it  has  a  hand¬ 
some  carriage  of  its  own.  Several  times  a  year  this  idol  is 
exposed  to  the  adoration  of  the  crowd,  no  other  having  so  great 
a  reputation  in  Rome 

An  old  marble  staircase,  which  had  seen  much  service  in 
the  ancient  Lateran  Palace,  has  contrived  to  gather  to  itself  an 
astonishing  reputation  for  sanctity.  Sixtus  V.  was  the  Pope 
who  brought  it  into  notice.  In  rebuilding  the  palace,  he  dis¬ 
covered  that  it  was  the  same  staircase  on  which  Christ  de¬ 
scended  when  leaving  the  judgment-seat  of  Pilate.  Hence¬ 
forth  it  became  most  holy,  and  endowed  with  incalculable  vir¬ 
tues.  Sixtus  inclosed  it  in  a  building  opposite  the  church  of 
St.John  in  Lateran,  and  provided  lateral  staircases  for  descent 
and  for  profane  feet.  Several  thousand  years’  indulgence 
were  promised  to  every  one  who  made  the  ascent  on  his 
knees,  repeating  at  each  step  Paternosters  and  Ave  Marias. 
Go  now  when  you  will,  and  it  will  be  found  occupied  by  sin¬ 
ners,  male  and  female,  nobles  and  beggars,  side  by  side,  pain¬ 
fully  winning  their  way  to  the  promised  indulgence.  At  the 
bottom  there  is  always  on  duty  a  monk,  who  demands  alms, 
and  at  the  top  a  contribution  plate  beside  a  crucifix,  into  which 
the  pilgrims  deposit  their  offerings  while  reverently  kissing 
and  repeating  a  prayer  over  each  wound  of  Christ.  So  great 
is  the  concourse,  that  wooden  steps  have  been  placed  over  the  , 
stones,  to  protect  them  from  the  pious  wear.  After  all,  the 
pilgrims  do  not  touch  the  veritable  steps,  a  fact  which  they 


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295 


THE  HOLY  STAIRS. 


seem  entirely  to  overlook,  but  which  one  would  suppose  would 
detract  somewhat  from  the  promised  blessings.  In  my  for¬ 
getfulness  of  its  sanctity,  I  began  to  ascend  it  on  my  feet,  but 
the  attendant  priest  requested  me  to  desist.  "While  I  paused, 
some  French  soldiers  went  by  with  a  wonderful  celerity  on 


296 


ITALIAN  SIGHTS  AND  PAPAL  PRINCIPLES 


their  knees,  evidently  in  a  profane  race  to  see  ■who  would  first 
arrive  at  the  top. 

The  Church  contains  a  wonderful  assortment  of  relics  :  the 
heads  of  St.  Peter  and  St.  Paul,  as  usual  in  jeweled  cases  of 
silver ;  a  lock  of  the  Virgin  Mary’s  hair,  and  a  fragment  of 
one  of  her  petticoats  ;  some  blood  of  Christ ;  the  table  at 
which  he  ate  the  Last  Supper — a  small  affair,  suitable  for  a 
cafe  the-a-tHe,  but  never  intended  for  thirteen,  an  anomaly  the 
relic  manufacturers  impolitically  overlooked.  Then  there  are 
the  rods  of  Moses  and  Aaron,  with  a  portion  of  the  Ark  of  the 
Covenant ;  the  pillar  off  which  the  cock  crew  when  Peter  de¬ 
nied  Christ,  and  other  wonders  surpassing  belief. 

The  relics  of  the  Virgin  Mary  in  ecclesiastical  museums  are 
surprisingly  numerous,  while  Joseph  appears  to  have  left  no 
memorials  behind  him.  At  Loretto  we  have  her  entire  house, 


vows  TO  THK  VITIOTN,  . 


ITALIAN  SIGHTS  AND  PAPAL  PRINCIPLES. 


20T 


transported  by  angels  from  the  Holy  Land.  Were  all  her 
property  restored  to  it,  one  might  get  a  tolerable  insight  into 
her  domestic  affairs  ;  for  we  have  quite  a  wardrobe  of  hers  re¬ 
maining,  besides  the  cradle  of  the  infant  Jesus,  preserved  at  the 
church  of  Santa  Maria  Maggiore,  in  total  forgetfulness  of  the 
scriptural  fact  that  the  new-born  babe  was  laid  in  a  manger. 

I  will  give  a  list  of  some  of  the  most  noted  relics  preserved 
at  different  shrines,  to  show  what  the  Church  of  Rome  exhib¬ 
its  instead^  of  the  simple  Word  of  God.  They  exist  in  such 
profusion  wherever  the  Roman  Catholic  priesthood  have  sway, 
that  it  is  really  difficult  to  select  a  collection  which  shall  em¬ 
brace  the  absurdities  of  all,  as  their  number  and  variety  are 
legion.  One  of  the  richest  and  most  select,  however,  of  these 
shrines  is  that  of  St.  Mark’s,  at  Venice.  It  is  open  at  certain 
hours  to  the  public  for  a  stated  fee.  The  wealth  in  precious 
metals  and  jewels  lavished  upon  the  vessels  and  tabernacles 
which  contain  these  ghastly  remains  is  incalculable.  Were  all 
the  idle  and  idolatrous  treasure  of  Italy  actively  employed  for 
the  benefit  of  the  living,  it  would  give  her  schools  throughout 
her  territory,  or  connect  it  by  a  network  of  railways  ;  in  either 
case  affording  education  or  work  to  her  starving  multitudes. 

The  sacristan  of  St.  Mark’s  ushered  me  into  the  sanctuary 
where  its  treasures  are  kept.  At  the  first  glance  one  would 
suppose  he  had  fallen  into  Aladdin’s  cave,  so  brightly  shone 
the  gold  and  silver,  gleaming  with  rare  and  costly  stones. 
Closer  inspection,  however,  betrayed  the  contents  of  the  glass 
vials  in  which  most  of  them  were  preserved.  There  were 
arm  and  leg  bones  without  number  ;  fragments  of  morbid  hu¬ 
manity,  of  every  shape  and  variety,  labeled  “  a  piece  of  Saint” 
this  or  Saintess  that — precious  to  the  faith  of  the  believing, 
it  is  devoutly  to  be  hoped,  but  repulsive  to  doubting  eyes.  ^ 
The  taste  of  Roman  Catholics  for  the  morbidly  horrible  in 
death’s  doings  is  strangely  general.  At  Notre  Dame,  in  Paris, 


298 


ITALIAN  SIGHTS  AND  PAPAL  PRINCIPLES. 


they  showed  me  the  spine  of  the  late  archbishop,  which  had 
been  dissected  from  his  corpse  to  he  exhibited  to  his  late  pa¬ 
rishioners. 

The  relics  at  St.  Mark’s  that  I  particularly  noticed  were  as 
follows  : 

The  Thumb  of  St.  Mark. 

A  lock  of  the  Virgin’s  Hair,  bright  auburn,  looking  as  if  re¬ 
cently  cut  from  a  child’s  head. 

Some  of  the  Blood  of  Christ. 

Some  of  the  Earth  soaked  with  it. 

A  piece  of  his  Garment  without  a  seam. 

Four  pieces  of  the  True  Cross,  one  of  which  belonged  to  the 
Empress  Irene  of  Constantinople. 

One  Nail  of  the  True  Cross.  (There  is  another  at  Paris,  one 
at  Milan,  one  at  Rome,  and  the  iron  crown  of  Lombardy  is 
said  also  to  have  been  made  of  them.) 

Two  of  the  Thorns  of  the  Crown. 

A  Rib  of  St.  Peter. 

A  Rib  of  St.  Paul. 

A  portion  of  the  Skull  of  St.John  the  Baptist.  (The  entire 
head  is  preserved  at  Geneva  ;  but  duplicates  of  saintly  remains 
are  no  more  miraculous  than  their  preservation  at  all,  and  do 
not  appear  to  weaken  faith  in  their  authenticity.) 

Two  of  the  Stones  used  at  the  martyrdom  of  St.  Stephen. 

The  most  remarkable  appeal  to  public  credulity  is  to  be 
found  at  Cologne,  in  the  well-known  collection  of  the  relics  of 
St.  Ursula  and  her  eleven  thousand  virgin  companions,  all  of 
whom,  the  Church  teaches  her  disciples  to  believe,  were  wan- 
tonly.massacred  by  a  horde  of  barbarians,  somewhere  between 
the  years  237  and  451  of  the  Christian  era,  for  refusing  to  sub¬ 
mit  to  their  embraces.  “  He  must  have  an  iron  head,”  says 
our  high  authority,  “  who  will  maintain  that  tlis  sublime  old 
tradition  of  Cologne  does  not  merit  belief.” 

O 


ITALIAN  SIGHTS  AND  PAPAL  PRINCIPLES. 


Be  that  as  it  may,  the  Church  of  St.  Ursula  exhibits  to  this 
(lay,  in  the  so-called  “  Golden  Chamber,  admission  fixed  at 
thirty  cents,  for  the  benefit  of  the  Church,”  one  hundred  and 
seventy  skulls,  inclosed  in  velvet  cases,  overlaid  with  silver 
and  precious  stones.  These  are  arranged  on  shelves,  and  grin 
ghastly  upon  the  spectator  from  their  richly-decorated  cases, 
which  contrast  horribly  in  their  mock  splendor  with  the  empty 
eye-sockets  and  high  cheek-bones  of  death.  On  the  head  of 
St.  Ursula  there  is  a  crown  of  great  value.  The  attendant 
monk,  as  he  relates  the  legend  of  their  death,  calls  upon  the 
visitor,  with  great  unction,  to  admire  the  glossy  flaxen  hair  of 
the  virgin  saint,  which  he  is  allowed  to  handle,  besides  placing 
his  fingers  in  the  cleft  skulls  of  those  who  came  to  their  deaths 
by  sabre  strokes.  Most  of  these  skulls  bear  names,  and  are 
thus  catalogued : 

No.  2.  “  The  Head  of  St.Etherius,  bridegroom  of  St.TJrsula, 
with  the  teeth  well  preserved.” 

No.  14.  “  Aurelius,  King  of  Sardinia” — and  a  large  number 
of  bishops,  dukes,  priests,  and  soldiers,  all  numbered,  in  reck¬ 
less  disregard  of  their  unvirginlike  association  of  sex  and  em¬ 
ployment. 

No.  23.  “  St.  Benedicta,  Duchess,  who  led  a  cohort  of  the 
holy  legion.” 

No.  32.  “  Florentia,  dueen.” 

No.  36.  “Florentia,  a.  Princess  of  Negroes.” 

No.  50.  “A  small  silver  shrine,  containing  parts  of  Christ’s 
rod.” — What  rod  ? 

Nos.  55  and  57.  “The  right  Arm  and  Foot  of  St. Ursula — 
her  hair-net,”  etc. 

No.  60.  (The  naivete  of  the  printed  description  of  this  is 
particularly  funny. — “  A  Water-cruet  used  at  the  wedding  meal 
at  Cana,  brought  to  Cologne  by  St.  Bruno.  An  eye-witness, 
who  has  been  in  Cana,  assures  us  that  there  are  only  five  of 


300 


ITALIAN  SIGHTS  AND  PAPAL  PRINCIPLES. 


these  water-pots,  and  that  the  sixth  he  has  seen  in  our  Golden 
Chamber  is  perfectly  like  the  five  other  pots.”  Can  we  won- 
der  at  the  simplicity  of  the  flocks,  when  such  is  the  erudition 
of  the  shepherds  ? 

Besides  these  relics  there  are  six  hundred  and  twelve  heads, 
adorned  with  golden  embroidery,  in  gilded  glass  chests. 

This  church  is  a  Golgotha  on  a  large  scale.  The  walls  in¬ 
close  a  solid  mass  of  bones,  symmetrically  piled  for  the  space 
of  eighty  feet  in  length  by  ten  in  height  and  two  in  width, 
which  the  monks  joyfully  point  out  as  confirmatory  of  their 
legend.  As  late  as  the  year  1642,  some  fourteen  hundred 
years  after  the  martyrdom,  the  liquid  blood  of  St.  Ursula  was 
discovered,  as  fresh  as  if  just  shed ;  but  the  monks,  probably 
from  fear  of  another  discovery,  immediately  reburied  it. 

It  is  a  dismal  church,  full  of  bones,  and  skulls,  and  cofflns, 
and  all  sorts  of  quaint  pictures  of  monkish  legends,  and  gloomy 
architecture.  When  I  left  it,  darkness  had  overshadowed  all, 
and  my  shaven  and  cowled  guide  was  obliged  to  light  a  candle 
to  pilot  me  out.  As  we  passed  a  confessional-box,  a  woman 
suddenly  arose  from  her  knees,  and  a  priest  stepped  from  that 
silent  witness  of  the  heart’s  burden  of  grief  and  sin,  and  dis¬ 
appeared  in  the  recesses  of  the  tomb-like  church.  She  had 
just  finished  her  confession  ;  and,  with  a  rapid  step  and  bow¬ 
ed  head,  passed  rapidly  by.  But  what  an  hour  and  what  a 
place  to  select  for  penitence  and  absolution  !  The  grim  relics 
of  death  above,  below,  and  on  all  sides.  Each  step  disturbed 
the  ashes  and  repose  of  a  grave.  Night  lent  additional  ghast¬ 
liness  to  the  scene.  A  lady  was  with  me.  She  pressed  close¬ 
ly  to  my  side,  and  drew  a  long  breath  of  relief  as  we  stepped 
over  the  gloomy  threshold,  and  found  ourselves  once  more 
breathing  the  pure  air  of  heaven. 

The  most  conspicuous  object  of  adoration  at  Rome  is  a  ven- 
er.ible  bronze  .«tntuc  of  St.  Peter ;  a  sitting  figure,  so  ancient 


ITALIAN  SIGHTS  AND  PAPAL  PRINCIPLES 


301 


that  it  is  generally  asserted  to  be  an  old  pagan  deity,  perhaps 
Jupiter  himself,  or,  at  all  events,  some  eminent  heathen  char- 


ADOBATION  OF  THE  STATUE  OF  ST.  PETER, 


acter,  a  consul  or  magistrate,  but  now  transformed  by  modern 
cunning  into  the  sacred  image  of  the  fisherman-saint. 

This  is  the  particular  idol  which  the  Pope  loves  to  venerate 


302 


ITALIAN  SIGHTS  AND  PAPAL  PRINCIPLES. 


in  public  ;  consequently,  all  good  Catholics  follow  his  example 
for  their  souls!  sake.  The  motives  of  his  Holiness  possibly  are 
pure  and  orthodox  ;  but  the  act  itself  is  idolatry,  and,  as  such, 
becomes  not  only  a  license,  but  an  example  to  the  multitude. 
On  certain  festivals  the  Pope  and  high  dignitaries  go  to  St. 
Peter’s  for  this  purpose,  pressing  their  lips  fervently  to  the 
birazen  toe,  and  then  touching  the  foot  with  their  chins  and 
foreheads  in  a  most  devout  manner,  greatly  to  the  edification 
of  a  countless  multitude,  who,  in  their  zeal  of  imitation,  rush 
toward  it  with  a  fury  that  threatens  to  endanger  the  stability 
of  the  statue  itself.  At  all  hours  worshipers  are  seen  before 
this  image.  The  rich  and  poor,  the  noble  and  peasant,  infancy 
and  age,  kneel  and  pray  before  it,  never  leaving  without  be¬ 
stowing  the  adoring  kiss,  and  pressing  the  forehead  against  the 
consecrated  heel.  So  numerous  are  their  embraces,  that  it 
has  been  found  necessary  to  protect  the  toe  by  an  additional 
covering  from  being  entirely  worn  away.  For  centuries  has 
this  idolatrous  worship  been  performed,  not  only  unrebuked, 
but  sanctioned  and  ordered  by  the  Roman  clergy  as  a  means 
of  salvation. 

The  degree  of  devotion  which  this  image  excites  is  very 
various.  It  would  be  amusing,  were  it  not  mournful,  to  wit¬ 
ness  the  daily  scenes  enacted  before  it.  I  have  seen  an  old 
woman,  tottering  with  age,  seize  the  foot  in  her  hands,  and 
kiss  the  toe  twenty  times  in  rapid  succession  with  all  the  im¬ 
petuosity  and  warmth  of  a  young  lover,  and  leave  with  an  un¬ 
mistakable  expression  of  pious  joy.  Mothers  press  the  un¬ 
willing  lips  of  babes  to  the  cold  metal ;  ignorant  of  its  efficacy, 
they  cry  and  shrink  from  the  embrace.  Their  older  brothers 
and  sisters  kneel,  and  lift  their  tiny  hands  toward  it,  as  we  are 
taught  to  do  when  we  say,  “  Our  Father,  who  art  in  heaven.” 
Young  girls  and  fashionable  mothers  in  squads  approach,  bow, 
take  out  their  laced  handkerchiefs,  polish  the  toe  clean,  and 


ITALIAN  SIGHTS  AND  PAPAL  PRINCIPLES. 


303 


then  apply  their  lips — some  devoutly,  and  others  with  a  hid¬ 
den  laugh,  as  if  nature  repudiated  the  mockery.  Old  men 
prostrate  themselves  before  the  silent  mass  of  metal  as  if  it 
were  the  tabernacle  of  the  “  Most  High.”  There  is  no  mistak¬ 
ing  their  sincerity.  The  worship,  however  mistaken,  gives 
them  spiritual  satisfaction,  doubtless  far  more  acceptable  be¬ 
fore  Heaven  than  the  scoffs  and  jibes  of  the  cold  reasoner,  who, 
seeing  no  religion  in  this,  denies  the  existence  of  a  Deity  al¬ 
together. 

The  spirit  of  the  age  extorts,  even  from  the  Homan  Church 
in  Italy,  some  concessions  to  Protestantism.  She  does  not  per¬ 
mit,  but  she  shuts  her  eyes  to  the  fact,  that  Protestants  in 
Rome,  Naples,  Florence,  and  other  capitals  gather  together  on 
Sundays,  in  “  upper  chambers”  or  in  humble  chapels — to  which 
bells  are  forbidden — to  worship.  These  isolated  meetings,  in 
which  religion  is  reduced  to  the  standard  of  apostolic  simplic¬ 
ity,  carry  one  back  to  its  early  history,  when,  under  the  more 
enlightened  pagan  emperors,  all  Christians  were  tacitly  allow¬ 
ed  thus  to  meet  for  prayer  and  exhortation.  Is  it  not  strange 
that,  after  eighteen  centuries,  upon  a  nominally  Christian  soil, 
the  same  limited  privilege  only  is  conceded  to  Christians  by 
the  sovereign  pontiff,  the  Christian  head  of  the  Church  and 
state,  as  then  was  permitted  by  a  Claudius  or  Titus,  sovereigns 
and  pontiffs  of  universal  heathendom  1  The  Protestants  of  the 
first  century,  in  the  fourth  succeeded  to  the  throne  and  power. 
Jupiter  was  cast  aside  forever.  The  Roman  Church  banished 
from  the  earth  the  grosser  crimes  and  practices  of  paganism. 
Mankind  owe  her  much.  But  she  is  now  in  her  decrepitude  ; 
she  is  dying  out.  The  worship  of  St.  Peter  will  be  cast  aside, 
in  its  turn,  as  an  obsolete  idea.  On  its  ruins  there  will  arise 
a  purer  faith,  which,  in  presenting  to  man  a  “  Father  in  heav¬ 
en,”  shall  stimulate  him  to  progress  in  virtue  and  knowledge. 

In  the  mean  time.  Popery  is  busy  preaching  and  proselytiz- 


304 


ITALIAN  SIGHTS  AND  PAPAL  PRINCIPLES, 


ing.  The  ignorant  preacher  seeks  to  excite  the  passions,  and 
not  to  awaken  the  understanding  of  his  hearers.  The  Roman 


STREET  PREACHING. 


is  theatrical  even  in  his  church.  He  does  not  hesitate  to  re¬ 
call  the  crowd  from  Punch  and  Judy  to  the  crucifix  by  exclaim¬ 
ing,  as  he  points  to  the  bleeding  Savior,  “JS'cco  il  vero  pulci- 
nella  /”  “  Behold  the  true  Punch  !”  Tie  Icnows  how  to  touch 


ITALIAN  SIGHTS  AND  PAPAL  PRINCIPLES. 


305 


the  chord  of  their  hearts,  for  he  has  made  them  what  they 
are. 

One  of  her  writers  spoke  thus  of  souls  in  Purgatory : 

“  Imagine  that  the  poor  soul  has  his  eyes  upon  you,  and 
looks  with  anxiety  to  see  whether  you  give  or  refuse.  If  it 
perceives  that  you  have  your  hands  in  your  pocket,  it  experi¬ 
ences  a  delight,  which  augments  in  proportion  as  your  offering 
approaches  the  contribution-box ;  when  the  money  is  held 
over  it,  the  soul  jumps  from  the  flames,  and  when  the  gift  falls, 
the  soul  springs  with  pleasure.  Oh!  to  procure  to  those  that 
you  love  a  moment  so  sweet,  to  make  them  taste  these  delights, 
if  you  have  not  money  yourself,  borrow  of  your  neighbor,  who, 
if  he  refuses,  will  be  more  culpable  than  you.” 

A  small  sum  will  buy,  at  almost  any  of  the  churches  of 
Rome,  sufficient  masses  to  free  a  soul  from  Purgatory  for  from 
3000  to  30,000  years  ;  and  it  needs  but  more  money  to  extend 
the  time  indefinitely.  Hell-fire  is  not,  however,  to  be  bought 
off.  The  rich  have  no  difficulty  in  compounding  in  this  life 
for  any  peccadilloes  or  doctrines  that  do  not  affect  the  suprem¬ 
acy  of  the  Church.  The  Pope  issues,  for  a  consideration,  ab¬ 
solution  in  full  for  all  past  or  future  sins.  The  poor  would  be 
badly  off  were  it  not  that  every  where  friars  in  sackcloth,  or 
greasy-looking  individuals  in  long  white  night-gowns,  piously 
beg  through  the  principal  streets — rattling  a  tin  box  in  the 
ears  of  the  passers-by — alms  for  the  poor  in  Purgatory. 

Of  all  the  processions  of  the  Roman  Church,  the  final  one, 
which  bears  its  member  to  his  last  home,  is  the  most  curious 
and  lugubrious.  None  but  the  rich  can  afford  this  display. 
The  corpse  is  decked  in  its  most  brilliant  attire,  with  its  face 
painted  to  resemble  life,  and  placed  upon  an  open  bier,  which 
is  borne  through  the  streets  of  Rome,  followed  by  as  many 
deputations  of  friars  and  monks  from  the  several  convents  as 
the  family  of  the  deceased  can  afford  to  hire.  These  fall  into 


306 


ITALIAN  SIGHTS  AND  PAPAL  PRINCIPLES. 


ranks  like  so  many  military  companies,  bearing  crosses  and 
candles,  and  chanting  most  dismally  at  the  top  of  their  voices, 
so  that  they  can  be  heard  long  before  they  are  seen.  The 
effect  at  night  from  the  glare  of  their  torches  in  the  face  of 
the  corpse,  and  the  monotonous  and  mournful  notes  of  the 
hired  mourners,  is  unequaled  by  any  spectacle  I  have  ever 
seen  of  this  nature,  except  the  funeral  corteges  of  the  South 
Sea  Islanders,  when  a  whole  tribe  lift  up  their  voices  and  wail 
for  a  dead  chief.  There  is  no  cry  equal  to  that  for  sadness 
and  filling  the  soul  with  melancholy.  Among  the  savages, 
every  act  is  consonant  with  the  sad  office.  The  tears  fall  to 
earth,  but  the  wail  rises  to  heaven.  In  Rome,  the  mingling 
of  the  vanities  of  life  with  the  realities  of  death  is  shocking. 
I  have  seen  a  young  female,  on  an  open  bier,  her  cheeks 
blooming  with  color,  flowers  on  her  head,  while  she  was 
dressed  as  it  were  for  a  ball,  and  looking  as  fresh  and  rosy  as 
if  life  still  animated  her  rigid  limbs,  borne  through  the  streets 
at  night,  the  torches  lighting  up  with  a  ghastly  hue  her  beau¬ 
tiful  countenance,  which  seemed  as  if  it  only  slumbered,  while 
the  rain  poured  in  torrents  on  her  lifeless  form.  The  wetted 
priests  had  ceased  their  chant,  and  hurried  along  at  a  rapid 
pace  to  finish  their  job.  Few  strangers  would  have  supposed 
it  a  funeral,  and  fewer  still  that  that  lovely  corpse  was  not  a 
waxen  image.  But  it  was  unmistakable  death  on  one  of  its 
saddest  errands. 


A  KOMAN  FUNERAL. 


CHAPTER  XI. 


EFFECTS  OF  ROMANISM  ON  SOCIETY. 

I  HAVE  universally  found  that  the  difference  in  the  relative 
prosperity  of  the  inhabitants  of  Catholic  and  Protestant  coun¬ 
tries  Avas  in  ratio  to  the  degree  in  which  the  Holy  Father 
would  consider  the  former  faithful  and  the  latter  heretical. 
This  has  indeed  become  a  trite  observation  among  travelers  of 
both  religions.  But  no  less  a  writer  than  the  Abbe  Lamen- 
nais  denies  its  truth,  and  instances  for  his  authority  the  very 
countries  which  Protestants  claim  as  their  own  evidence. 
England,  Sweden,  and  Protestant  Germany,  according  to  him, 
are  given  over  to  irreligion,  licentiousness,  and  political  tur¬ 
moil  ;  while  those  countries  that  repose  under  the  shadow  of 
the  Holy  See  are  stable  in  their  institutions  and  united  in 
their  faith.  A  monk  of  St.  Bernard,  in  conversation  with  me 
on  the  extent  and  progress  of  the  United  States,  acknowledged 
that  we  were  indeed  a  great  nation  physically  ;  but,  said  he, 
“  what  a  pity  it  is  you  have  no  religion.  You  will  soon  perish.” 

Such  is  the  general  sentiment  among  rigid  Catholics.  They 
can  not  conceive  how  good  morals,  prosperity,  a  wise  govern¬ 
ment,  or  salvation  can  exist  independent  of  papal  authority. 
To  secure  its  supremacy,  they  are  ever  ready  to  trample  upon 
these  rights  which  we  believe  to  be  essential  to  human  prog¬ 
ress.  Liberty  of  press  and  conscience,  and  the  separation  of 
civil  and  religious  government,  they  consider  equivalent  to  an¬ 
archy  and  atheism.  The  very  enterprise,  toleration,  and  free¬ 
dom  of  thought  which  are  developed  by  our  political  institii- 


ITALIAN  SIGHTS  AND  PAPAL  PRINCIPLES. 


309 


tions,  and  which  we  fondly  conceive  to  he  the  fruits  of  our 
righteousness,  are,  in  their  eyes,  so  many  witnesses  of  our  cor¬ 
ruption  and  infidelity.  With  them,  absolution,  or  centring 
faith  and  power  in  the  Roman  Church,  is  the  “  one  thing  need¬ 
ful”  for  humanity.  This  accomplished,  they  close  their  view 
to  all  farther  comparison ;  or  if  by  chance  they  look  abroad, 
and  the  wide  gulf  between  the  wealth,  comforts,  intelligence, 
and  energy  of  Catholic  and  Protestant  states  is  too  obvious  not 
to  be  acknowledged,  they  class  the  latter  among  those  who,  in- 
gaining  the  whole  vforld,  are  losing  their  own  souls. 

Believing,  as  we  do,  that  the  possession  of  the  good  things 
of  this  earth  proceeds  mainly  from  those  qualities  that  heap 
up  most  treasure  in  heaven — or,  in  other  words,  that  virtue 
and  vice,  whether  of  the  individual  or  nation,  have  their  ap¬ 
pointed  rewards  and  punishments  in  this  life  as  well  as  in  that 
to  come — we  consider  it  a  fair  rule  to  judge  papal  rule  by  its 
fruits.  In  one  Swiss  canton  we  find  no  beggars,  universal 
thrift,  cleanliness,  and  enterprise  ;  in  another,  beggary,  pov¬ 
erty,  dirt,  and  general  distress.  The  one  is  Protestant,  and 
the  other  Catholic. 

But  as  Protestantism  predominates  in  Switzerland,  the  con¬ 
trasts  are  not  so  striking  as  between  those  Catholic  countries 
which  are  exclusively  the  religious  property  of  the  Roman 
See,  and  England,  Prussia,  and  the  United  States,  where  Prot¬ 
estantism,  although  enforcing  toleration,  sways  or  influences 
the  entire  population.  France  is  in  a  transition  state,  a  chaos 
of  atheism,  bigotry,  and  sentiment.  Its  shop-keepers,  in  min¬ 
gled  devotion  and  blasphemy,  scarce  knowing  themselves 
which  impulse  predominates,  place  over  their  doors,  “ia 
Grace  de  Dieu'’’  (the  Grace  of  God),  as  a  sign  to  attract  custom, 
as  may  be  seen  in  the  street  St.Roch,  at  Paris.  The  Span¬ 
iards  call  a  fighting  vessel  the  “  Most  Holy  Trinity;”  and  the 
Romans  name  a  bank  “  The  Holy  Ghost but  these  names 


310 


ITALIAN  SIGHTS  AND  PAPAL  PRINCIPLES. 


are  given  in  sincerity  and  solemnity.  France  has  grown  pros¬ 
perous  and  strong  in  proportion  as  she  has  become  tolerant 
and  free  from  the  control  of  Rome  ;  while  Italy  and  Spain, 
the  beloved  of  the  Church,  are  filled  from  one  extremity  to 
another,  in  proportion  as  they  are  steeped  in  Romanism,  with 
indolence,  superstition,  beggary,  and  their  concomitant  vices. 
If,  then,  wherever  Romanism  is  omnipotent  we  perceive  these 
results,  it  is  natural  to  infer  that  they  follow  the  relation  of 
cause  and  effect. 

My  inquiries  relate  to  Italy,  and  chiefly  to  Rome.  Through¬ 
out  the  peninsula,  except  where  the  new-born  liberality  of 
Piedmont  stimulates,  or  the  iron  hand  of  Austria,  as  in  Lom¬ 
bardy,  crushes,  we  find  indolence  the  national  characteristic. 
The  Church  encourages  this  parent  of  vice  by  appropriating 
more  than  a  quarter  of  the  year  to  festivals,  on  which  all  la¬ 
bor  is  forbidden  and  amusements  encouraged.  The  vacations 
of  the  schools,  on  this  account  alone,  are  so  numerous,  that  the 
general  ignorance  ceases  to  be  a  wonder.  Undoubtedly  many 
of  the  holidays  originated  in  the  desire  to  relieve  overtaxed 
labor,  and  recall  the  untaught  mind  to  sentiments  of  religion; 
but,  during  so  many  centuries,  saints  have  so  rapidly  increased 
as  to  threaten  to  entirely  monopolize  the  time  of  the  living. 
“  Let  the  dead  bury  their  dead,”  has  a  pointed  moral  in  Italy 
in  the  present  age. 

Another  cause  of  indolence  are  the  fetters  imposed  on 
knowledge.  There  are  numerous  primary  schools,  it  is  true. 
Rome  alone  possesses  three  hundred  and  seventy-two,  which 
receive  about  fourteen  thousand  children  of  both  sexes. 
Throughout  the  country  they  exist  gratuitously ;  but,  besides 
the  simplest  elements  of  instruction,  they,  as  well  as  the  uni¬ 
versities,  are  made  subordinate  to  papacy.  The  instructors, 
in  general,  are  priests.  The  Church  Catechism  is  a  text-book. 
All  knowledge  that  tends  to  expand  the  mind,  liberalize  ideas. 


ITALIAN  SIGHTS  AND  PAPAL  PRINCIPLES 


311 


or  develop  physical  energy  iinsuited  to  the  theory  of  absolu¬ 
tism,  is  rigorously  tabooed.  Their  intent  is  not  to  make  citi¬ 
zens,  but  to  make  subjects — to  train  disciples,  and  not  masters. 
Catholic  teachers  are  free  to  receive  Protestant  children,  but 
a  Protestant  teacher  is  forbidden  to  receive  a  Catholic  pupil. 
Indeed,  it  is  with  difficulty  that  Protestant  parents  can  educate 
their  children,  unless  they  submit  to  the  requisitions  of  the 
priesthood.  Even  the  Catholic  principal  of  the  best  institu- 


ITALIAN  HOLIDAY 


312 


ITALIAN  SIGHTS  AND  PAPAL  PRINCIPLES. 


tion  ill  Tuscany,  a  Frenchman,  has  with  difficulty,. hy  the  in¬ 
terference  of  his  embassador,  been  allowed  to  continue  his 
school,  because  the  authorities  conceived  that  he  was  bringing 
up  his  pupils  to  be  “  too  manly."  They  even  wished  to  exile 
him  from  the  country. 

The  field  of  knowledge  being  thus  limited,  enterpHse  is  pro¬ 
portionally  so,  so  that  the  educated,  who  have  means,  become 
in  general  effeminate  idlers  and  corrupt  in  morals,  while  the 
poorer  sort  obtain  some  nominal  office  under  government  at 
one  or  two  shillings  per  day,  or  else  try  their  fortunes  in  the 
few  and  in  general  despised  branches  of  commerce  left  to  their 
option,  sufficiently  unfettered  as  to  admit  of  hope.  In  Ameri¬ 
ca  we  can  not  realize  the  extent  of  the  restrictions  to  personal 
freedom,  even  in  the  commonest  concerns  of  life,  which  are 
the  lot  of  Italians.  If  you  are  living  on  the  sea-shore,  you  are 
denied  the  use  of  a  boat  unless  as  a  licensed  fisherman.  Each 
city  has  its  custom-house.  I  have  seen  a  carriage  stopped  at 
the  gates,  and  a  penny’s  worth  of  cake,  which  a  little  girl  held 
in  her  hand  to  eat,  taken  and  taxed  the  smallest  copper  coin — 
equal  to  a  mill — for  which  a  receipt  was  regularly  made  out 
and  given  before  the  carriage  could  enter.  The  poor  are  un¬ 
mercifully  fleeced  at  every  gahelle,  while  the  rich  can  carry 
loads  of  merchandise,  unopened,  in  their  trunks  from  one  end 
of  Italy  to  another,  for  a  bribe  of  fifty  cents  given  at  each  cus¬ 
tom-house. 

From  Rome  I  have  gone  by  land  to  Naples,  thence  through 
some  of  the  northern  states  of  Italy,  and  back  to  Florence,  and 
never  once  opened  a  carriage-load  of  trunks.  The  gift  was 
expected,  as  a  matter  of  course  ;  but  for  the  officers  to  do  their 
duty,  that  was  quite  another  affair.  The  system  is  seen  in  its 
greatest  corruption  in  the  Neapolitan  kingdom.  At  every  ten 
miles  or  so  the  traveler  comes  to  a  dogana.  The  soldiers  stop 
the  carriage.  The  ladies  are  requested  to  alight,  and  the  gen- 


ITALIAN  SIGHTS  AND  PAPAL  PRINCIPLES. 


313 


tlemen  are  ushered  into  an  upper  room,  where,  in  solemn  dig¬ 
nity,  sit  the  officials,  who  become  prolix  upon  the  necessity  of 
a  strict  examination  of  the  baggage.  Should  you,  in  your  in¬ 
nocence,  offier  the  keys,  they  speak  more  to  the  point,  and  at 
last  plainly  say  that  it  will  save  both  trouble  and  expense  for 
you  to  give  them  a  fee.  Otherwise  they  will  be  sure  to  find 
something  contraband.  If  you  hand  a  Napoleon,  they  look  as¬ 
tonished  at  your  meanness,  and  shake  their  heads,  and  say  this 
will  never  do.  They  would  do  the  same  if  it  were  a  shilling. 
An  Italian  official  must  always  be  twice  paid.  The  smallest 
additional  gratuity  settles  the  difficulty  ;  and  with  a  profusion 
of  bows  and  good  wishes,  you  think  you  are  ready  to  proceed. 
Descending  the  stairs,  your  mistake  is  at  once  rectified.  First 
comes  the  officer  of  the  guard  for  his  gratuity  ;  next,  the  cor¬ 
poral  ;  next,  the  soldiers,  each  of  whom  swears  he  has  been 
your  special  guard — that  is,  he  has  invited  himself  to  a  ride  on 
your  box  for  a  mile  or  so  ;  and,  lastly,  Xhe  facchini,  or  porters, 
the  most  extortionate  of  all,  who  claim  high  pay  for  not  taking 
your  trunks  off.  This  is  all  done  amid  a  throng  of  beggars 
and  thieves,  who  pick  your  pockets  or  steal  from  the  carriage 
as  opportunity  offers,  at  the  same  time  stunning  heaven  with 
cries  for  charity,  or  calling  upon  the  Madonna  to  pass  to  your 
credit  above  the  coppers  you  have  distributed  among  them 
below. 

A  little  farther  on  occurs  a  similar  scene  at  a  so-called  pass¬ 
port-office.  I  have  had  money,  with  which  I  was  paying  a 
porter,  snatched  from  my  hand  in  the  streets  of  Naples  by  a 
sentinel  on  duty,  and  no  one  thought  it  strange.  Go  where 
you  will  in  this  kingdom,  and  you  find  a  similar  system  of  or¬ 
ganized  robbery,  which  makes  one  almost  regret  the  good  old 
days  of  banditti,  when  novelty  and  excitement  added  zest  to 
the  adventure  ;  but  now  it  is  barefaced  extortion,  disgusting 
wrangling,  and  inevitable  pillage.  Formerly  there  was  a 

O 


314 


ITALIAN  SIGHTS  AND  PAPAL  PRINCIPLES. 


chance  of  escape — now  none.  If  you  refuse  to  pay,  your  bag¬ 
gage  remains  untouched,  but  you  are  not  allowed  to  proceed. 
The  same  corruption  extends  through  all  classes,  with,  of 
course,  some  honorable  exceptions.  The  King  of  Naples  is 
well  known  as  the  chief  of  the  lazzaroni.  Hats,  handker¬ 
chiefs,  and  sundries  are  not  always  safe  at  an  Italian  ball,  or 
among  even  what  may  be  considered  a  genteel  crowd.  These 
peccadilloes,  with  lying  and  cheating,  so  common  among  even 
the  better  classes,  bespeak  a  defective  moral  education,  and 
find  their  solution  in  great  measure  in  the  confessional,  which 
acts  as  a  safety-valve  to  the  conscience,  a  little  money  or  tri¬ 
fling  penance  securing  indulgence  or  absolution,  until  at  last 
habit  destroys  the  sense  of  sin  and  shame  altogether. 

In  France,  lies  are  expected  as  a  matter  of  course.  Among 
the  ladies  they  pass  under  the  softened  expression  of  “  broder*'* 
(to  romance) ;  with  gentlemen,  more  vulgarly,  “  blaguer''  (to 
fib) ;  but  both  practice  the  vice  either  to  please  or  to  add 
piquancy  to  scandalous  gossip,  but  seldom  from  baser  motives. 
They  so  love  to  exaggerate,  that  their  daily  newspapers  arc 
universally  dated  a  day  in  advance ;  even  Galignani  has  been 
compelled  to  follow  their  example,  to  do  away  with  the  charge 
that  he  did  not  give  the  latest  news. 

With  the  Italians,  however,  lying  is  a  downright  vice.  With¬ 
out  the  courage  and  gallantry  of  the  French,  they  lie  from  fear 
as  well  as  fun.  One  need  have  no  greater  evidence  of  the  de¬ 
pravity  of  morals  among  the  higher  classes  of  Italian  cities 
than  the  universal  scandal,  which  spares  no  one,  and  at  the 
same  time  announces  a  general  corruption  inconceivable  in 
similar  circles  in  Protestant  countries,  or  which,  if  existing, 
would  doom  the  offenders  to  social  isolation.  So  the  universal 
suspicion  proclaims  the  equally-spread  habit  of  falsehood. 
However  much  courtesy  may  gild  social  intercourse,  the  ser¬ 
pent-head  of  distrust  is  seen  beneath.  Jealousy  is  equally 


ITALIAN  SIGHTS  AND  PAPAL  PRINCIPLES. 


315 


common  ;  not  the  more  honorable  sentiment  founded  on  a  re¬ 
gard  for  chastity,  but  the  meaner  spirit  begotten  of  envy.  It 
is  really  extraordinary  to  see  how  ludicrously,  not  to  say  in¬ 
humanly,  domestics  and  the  lower  classes  will  sometimes  ex¬ 
hibit  this,  when  one  would  suppose  that  common  wants  would 
produce  common  sympathies.  As  for  the  former,  when  it  ex¬ 
ists,  it  is  chiefly  among  lovers,  and  not  married  couples,  whose 
connubial  eye  is  supposed  to  be  blind.  I  have  heard  it  re¬ 
marked,  by  other  ladies,  of  one  of  the  chief  nobility  of  Tuscany 
— a  wife  and  mother  that  it  would  be  well  for  the  country  if 
it  possessed  more  of — “  How  strange  it  is  that  the  Duchess 

- contents  herself  with  only  her  husband.”  Such  is  the 

common  sentiment.  Matrimonial  fidelity  is  the  exception.  • 

Generally  speaking,  Italian  women  are  untidy,  both  as  house¬ 
keepers  and  in  their  toilet,  when  not  dressed  for  their  diurnal 
drive*.  This  arises  from  indolence  and  want  of  good  home  ed¬ 
ucations.  Convents  are  the  schools  of  Italian  mothers.  Slip¬ 
shod  at  home,  they  loiter  or  doze  away  their  time  after  the 
most  approved  listlessness,  indifferent  to  every  thing  but  ap¬ 
pearing  well  on  parade  or  at  the  Opera.  Their  households  are 
neglected,  children  intrusted  to  servants,  and  their  work,  if  any, 
confined  to  embroidery,  rarely  music,  and  sometimes  a  little 
painting  or  design.  Their  want  of  good  taste  in  dress,  in 
which,  as  a  class,  they  are  behind  every  other  civilized  nation, 
is  the  more  strange,  as  they  possess  a  natural  taste  for  the 
beautiful  in  art.  When  the  sex  is  thus  unrefined  in  person, 
the  mind  is  upon  a  par ;  so  that  one  is  not  astonished  to  find 
a  latitude  in  conversation,  and  an  ignorance  on  general  topics 
no  less  lamentable,  but  combined  with  an  amiability  and  wit 
which,  under  better  auspices  of  government  and  religion,  would 
raise  them  to  the  level  of  their  sex  in  more  favored  countries. 

The  general  effeminacy  and  want  of  energy  of  the  male  sex 
would  astonish  any  one  not  versed  in  their  political  history  for 


316 


ITALIAN  SIGHTS  AND  PAPAL  PRINCIPLE^. 


the  past  two  centuries.  They  weigh  like  nightmares  upon 
the  race ;  but,  without  scope  for  ambition,  or  even  ordinary 
physical  action,  what  else  can  he  expected  ? 

The  care  which  an  Italian  dandy  takes  to  preserve  himself 
from  the  fresh  air  of  heaven,  to  avoid  all  exercise,  and  to  de¬ 
velop  effeminate  beauty,  is  ludicrously  wonderful.  There  are 
said  to  be  not  over  three  days  of  their  delicious  climate  in  a 
year  which  are  all  right  for  an  Italian.  What  with  its  being 
too  hot  or  too  cold,  too  dry  or  too  humid,  too  changeable  or  too 
monotonous,  the  poor  weather  is  little  able  to  satisfy  the  race 
on  which  he  lavishes  most  of  his  bounties.  I  was  at  a  sea¬ 
side  watering-place  last  summer.  The  water  to  me,  who 
have  lived  eight  years  within  the  tropics,  was  uncomforta¬ 
bly  warm ;  but  the  titled  Italians  first  prepared  themselves 
for  their  sea-baths  by  aperient  medicines  and  a  course  of 
warm  baths,  so  that  their  systems  should  not  undergo  too  great 
a  shock. 

To  return  to  schools  and  ecclesiastical  education.  One  of 
its  chief  principles  tends  to  perpetuate  a  canker  which  is  gnaw¬ 
ing  at  the  vitals  of  Italy.  The  Church  honors  beggary  in  its 
bosom  by  sustaining  numerous  communities  of  idle  monks, 
who  live  on  the  charity  and  industry  of  the  public.  It  teaches 
through  all  its  lessons,  even  as  an  article  of  faith,  that  alms  ex¬ 
piate  sins,  and  that  it  is  necessary  to  give  continually  and 
abundantly  to  win  heaven.  Her  charity  is  not  of  doctrine  ; 
she  holds  none  in  store  for  those  who  deny  her  faith — they  are 
inevitably  damned  ;  but  in  good  works  and  alms-giving  she  is 
lavish,  because  by  them  she  buys  salvation  for  herself.  This 
abuse  of  the  doctrine  of  charity  is  twofold.  It  makes  heaven 
a  matter  of  barter,  and  teaches  the  poor  to  believe  that  it  is 
only  necessary  to  wear  rags,  and  live  in  filth  and  idleness,  for 
the  wealthy  to  become  their  debtors  ;  while  the  excess  of  good 
works  of  the  Church  provides  them  with  a  bed  in  a  hospital 


ITALfAN  SIGHTS  AND  PAPAL  PRINCIPLES. 


317 


when  ill,  a  snug  retreat  when  old,  and  the  gifts  of  the  rich  at 
all  times. 

“  By  the  sweat  of  thy  brow  shalt  thou  earn  thy  bread,”  was 
the  early  mandate  of  Heaven,  carrying  with  it  a  blessing.  The 
spur  of  want  is,  however,  the  only  sure  provocative  to  labor. 

In  Polynesia,  and  those  climates  where  Providence,  as  it  were, 
houses  and  feeds  man  gratis,  the  human  race  remains  station¬ 
ary,  never  rising  above  the  incipient  stages  of  ci’v'ilization. 
What  Providence  has  seen  fit  to  do  for  certain  races  of  savages, 
limiting  at  once  their  sphere  and  their  supply,  Rome,  from  the 
days  of  the  Gracchi  through  its  long  decadence,  sought  to  do 
for  its  turbulent  population.  But  that  which  God  did  in  wis¬ 
dom  man  imitated  in  folly.  The  Romans  looked  upon  the 
state  as  a  parent  bound  to  provide  for  its  offspring.  From 
daily  bread,  they  soon  learned  to  demand  their  daily  oil  and 
wine  ;  then  money  ;  and,  finally,  spectacles  and  amusements 
— all  gratis.  The  consequence  was,  that  Rome  trained  its  cit¬ 
izens  into  a  mongrel  race ‘of  beggars  and  robbers,  resolved  to 
live  without  labor.  They  succeeded,  but  Rome  fell ;  for  the 
curse  of  idleness  was  upon  it. 

The  Church  succeeded  the  Empire.  To  destroy  its  legacy 
of  corruption  was  no  easy  task,  but  one  to  which  Christianity  , 
v/as  equal,  had  she  not  herself  bowed  to  idols.  Under  her  im¬ 
perial  patrons  she  conquered,  but  did  not  reform.  True,  indi¬ 
vidual  virtue,  and  occasionally  able  and  upright  rulers,  did 
much  to  counteract  the  prominent  heathen  vices,  which  slowly 
disappeared  before  the  principles  of  the  Gospel ;  but  with  all 
their  power  they  were  inadequate,  in  the  hands  of  papacy,  to 
cleanse  the  foulest  fountain  of  them  all. 

The  modern  Italians — I  refer  to  the  lower  orders  in  cities 
and  the  great  highways,  not  to  the  peasantry  of  the  interior, 
than  whom  a  more  kindly,  frank,  and  appreciatory  race  does 
not  exist — like  the  ancient  Romans,  remain  a  race  with  out- 


318  ITALIAN  SIGHTS  AND  PAPAL  PRINCIPLES. 


stretched  hands.  They  are  beggars.  Beggary  has  become  an 
hereditary  vice.  Shame,  if  it  ever  existed,  has  long  since  for¬ 
saken  the  practice.  With  unblushing  falsehood,  it  is  to  be  seen 
in  the  palace  and  in  the  hovel,  in  all  its  cunning  degrees,  from 
the  throne  of  St.  Peter’s  to  the  veriest  wretch  that  coils  his 
scabby  limbs  under  its  shadow.  The  Church  is  responsible 
for  much  of  this,  not  from  design,  but  from  its  mistaken  doc- 


ITAT.TAN  MKNTtTC ANT5?. 


ITALIAN  SIGHTS  AND  PAPAL  PRINCIPLES. 


319 


trine,  that  the  greater  blessing  attends  the  giver  than  the  work¬ 
er.  It  honors  idleness,  sanctifies  the  spread  palm,  and  thus  im¬ 
pedes  labor.  Sixtus  V.  labored  diligently  to  arrest  this  evil. 
He  established  work-houses,  forbade  mendicity  under  the  se¬ 
verest  penalties,  and  sought  by  energetic  measures  to  extirpate 
the  pest,  but  in  vain.  After  brief  intervals  of  apparent  reform, 
it  reappeared  as  vicious  as  ever.  The  popes  forgot  that,  while 
weeding  with  one  finger,  they  were  bountifully  sowing  tares 
with  an  open  hand.  The  Romans,  of  all  Italians,  have  in  con¬ 
sequence  the  most  profound  aversion  to  labor.  They  are  list¬ 
less  and  silent  even  in  their  amusements,  varied  only  by  occa¬ 
sional  flashes  of  passion  or  the  excitement  of  the  Carnival. 

The  rich  give  abundantly  and  with  indiscriminating  gener¬ 
osity,  but  as  frequently  from  policy  or  ostentation.  Like  the 
old  patricians  with  their  clients,  they  gather  about  them  a 
numerous  horde  of  idle  dependents  or  professional  beggars, 
who,  content  in  the  abasement  of  receiving  gratis  their  daily 
subsistence,  have  ceased  to  envy  the  enormous  possessions  of 
their  lords.  Nearly  three  fifths  of  the  real  estate  within  the 
walls  of  Rome  belong  to  less  than  one  hundred  families ;  the 
remaining  two  fifths  to  the  hospitals  and  convents.  Conse¬ 
quently,  not  one  in  a  thousand  of  the  inhabitants  of  Rome  has 
any  fixed  property.  The  Church  and  government,  including 
the  few  noble  families  able  to  support  their  state,  own  all  Rome 
— a  state  of  things  sufficient  in  itself  to  kill  enterprise,  and 
keep  the  city  as  it  is,  a  century  behind  even  the  other  capitals 
of  Italy. 

Each  city  has  its  characteristic  type  of  beggars,  though  none 
is  without  specimens  of  all,  as  they  are  a  wandering  race, 
and  move  to  where  charities  are  most  abundant.  Rome,  how¬ 
ever,  is  the  capital  of  beggardom.  In  Venice  they  ply  their 
art  in  gondolas.  In  Florence  they  dress  in  filthy  rags,  whine 
piteously,  expose  infants,  and  train  bright-eyed  young  girls  to 


330 


ITALIAN  SIGHTS  AND  PAPAL  PRINCIPLES. 


vraylay  strangers,  demanding  alms  with  a  pertinacity  proof 
against  all  repulse,  though  liable  to  the  penalties  of  the  law  ; 
in  fact,  throughout  Tuscany  they  are  the  dirtiest  and  most  beg¬ 
garly  set  of  beggars  Italy  can  show.  At  the  entrance  of  Yas- 
sieux’s  reading-room,  a  white-haired  old  man,  bent  with  age, 
his  clothes  hanging  together  by  scanty  stitches,  is  to  be  seen 
sitting  in  one  position,  and  always  in  the  same  spot ;  for  years 
he  has  been  thus  ;  he  never  speaks,  but,  as  the  visitors  pass, 
meekly  bows  his  head — silent  if  he  receives  a  copper,  and 
equally  silent  if  disappointed.  His  dumb  appeal  is  not  with¬ 
out  its  fruits.  A  more  expressive  image  of  venerable  patience, 
poverty,  and  humility  the  imagination  never  conceived  ;  and 
yet,  I  presume,  the  old  dodge,  like  Beppo,  the  legless,  roguish 
king  of  beggars  at  Rome,  is  rich,  and  able  to  dower  his  daugh¬ 
ters,  if  he  have  any. 

In  Naples  they  beg  for  the  fun  of  it;  bright-eyed,  merry 
boys,  full  of  life  and  activity,  or  lazzaroni,  up  to  a  thousand 
tricks  to  excite  compassion  and  gain  the  trifling  sum  that  will 
feed  them  for  a  week,  while  for  a  bed,  stone  steps  or  a  basket 
are  sufficiently  comfortable.  But  at  Naples  they  are  all  ready 
to  do  any  thing  but  actual  labor  to  unloose  your  purse-strings  ; 
they  will  lie,  cheat,  or  steal,  as  temptation  offers,  and,  if  it 
please  you,  dance,  sing,  ingulf  macaroni,  and  play  the  jack¬ 
anapes  after  the  drollest  fashion  possible.  There  is  fun  and 
misehief  in  their  begging  which  half  disguises  its  viciousness. 

The  begging  monks  form  a  class,  sui  generis^  under  the  es¬ 
pecial  patronage  of  the  Church.  They  are  the  greatest  eye¬ 
sores  of  the  community,  being  in  general  men  of  almost  bru¬ 
talized  appearance,  unctuous  and  ignorant,  and  of  correspond¬ 
ing  habits. 

Beggary  in  Italy  is  elevated  to  the  rank  of  an  occupation. 
Men  and  women  are  born  and  die  beggars,  as  their  parents  be¬ 
fore  them.  This  class  appears  the  rnoxe  numerous,  because 


ITALIAN  SIGHTS  AND  PAPAL  PRINCIPLES. 


321 


they  have  the  art  of  multiplying  themselves,  as  it  were, 
interminably.  They  are  the  carrion  crows  of  benevolence, 
stripping  it  to  its  very  bones,  and  scenting  their  game  afar  off. 
There  is  no  end  to  their  disguises  and  ailments.  Proteus-like, 
they  change  their  rags  and  diseases  to  suit  every  phase  of 
charity.  With  an  ubiquity  that  savors  of  marvelousness,  they 
are  here,  there,  and  every  where  at  the  same  instant ;  now 
lame,  then  dropsical,  all  at  once  minus  an  eye,  arm,  or  leg,  cov¬ 
ered  with  sores,  rheumatic,  crippled  by  age  or  famished  by 
hunger ;  surrounded  by  nursing,  starving  children ;  assuming 
every  shape  of  disease  or  deformity,  with  crutches  and  all  the 
outward  appeals  to  sympathy,  they  excite  terror  and  disgust 
as  often  as  charity.  There  is  no  disguising  their  barefaced  im¬ 
position.  If  their  imperfections  are  real,  the  eighteen  hospi¬ 
tals  of  R/ome  are  ample  for  their  relief.  But  they  are  like  Bed¬ 
ouins  in  their  habits,  and  prefer  the  plunder  of  the  public  to 
the  legitimate  relief  of  their  wants.  They  are  to  be  seen 
chiefly  on  the  steps  of  the  churches,  when  not  begging,  swear¬ 
ing,  card-playing,  quarreling,  or  sleeping  from  morning  to 
night ;  where  they  then  retire  to,  no  decent  mortal  may  know. 

In  contrast  with  these  are  the  genteel  beggars  ;  counts  and 
countesses,  veiled  ladies  in  black,  who  haunt  theatres  ;  others 
in  gayer  costumes,  who  track  you  to  your  homes  ;  all  begging 
under  some  pretext  or  other,  and  grateful  for  half  a  dollar, 
when,  from  their  appearance,  you  feel  ashamed  to  offer  the 
man  an  eagle.  I  have  had  a  well-dressed  gentleman  approach 
me  in  the  street,  bow  with  great  courtesy,  apologize  for  inter¬ 
rupting  me,  and  then  go  on  to  inform  me  that  he  was  of  the 
higher  classes,  but  had  lost  his  money,  and  would  be  thankful 
for  a  “  mezzo  haiocco^''  half  cent !  Ladies,  too,  so  grateful  as  to 
kiss  your  hands  for  half  a  dime !  The  degradation  in  such 
cases  is  too  deep  for  the  poverty  to  be  wholly  genuine. 

The  system  of  asking  is  universal.  At  certain  palaces  where 

0  2 


njFujfntiT 


(;ENTEKL  BEOOaK. 


ITALJAN  SIGHTS  AND  PAPAL  PRINCIPLES. 


32:} 


you  may  have  dined,  the  servants  demand  of  you  a  fee.  Me¬ 
chanics,  tradesmen  even,  all  who  serve  you  in  one  way  or 
other,  with  few  exceptions,  ask  for  something  additional,  grate¬ 
ful  if  they  get  it,  and  nevertheless  ready  to  try  again  if  they 
fail.  In  the  country,  on  the  usual  routes  of  travelers,  this  nui¬ 
sance  is  universal.  Children  follow  the  carriage  for  miles 
clamoring  for  coppers,  and,  if  refused,  salute  your  ear  with  a 
curse,  and  “  May  you  break  your  neck  !  may  the  apoplexy  seize 
you !”  or  some  equally  welcome  catastrophe,  winding  up  with 
some  demoniacal  sign  indicative  of  had  luck.  I  have  always 
noticed  that  Italians  never  failed  to  counteract  the  spell  by 
some  cabalistic  movement  of  the  fingers,  known  only  to  the 
initiated. 

The  usual  reference  is  to  the  Madonna  for  your  welfare, 
though  all  the  saints  in  the  calendar  are  in  turn  invoked. 
Sometimes,  especially  with  the  Romans  and  Neapolitans,  there 
is  a  touch  of  flattery,  or  a  dubious  wish  expressed  in  their  de¬ 
mands,  extremely  naive,  and  not  always  creditable  to  the  mor¬ 
als  of  either  party ;  as,  for  instance,  “  May  your  handsome 
Excellency  be  fortunate  in  your  amours.” 

Aside  from  the  parasitical  and  fictitious  misery  of  Italy, 
there  exists  a  vast  amount  of  real,  which  even  the  colossal 
proportions  of  Roman  Catholic  charity  are  not  sufficient  to  re¬ 
lieve.  The  mass  of  the  people,  in  ordinary  times,  are  but 
scantily  supplied  with  even  the  most  indifferent  and  least 
nourishing  qualities  of  food  ;  consequently,  in  times  of  scarci¬ 
ty,  they  are  reduced  to  a  condition  bordering  on  absolute  star¬ 
vation.  Their  chief  diet  is  coarse  bread,  beans,  and  chestnuts. 
Any  thing  better  partakes  of  the  character  of  luxuries.  The 
faintness  or  want  of  strength  resulting  from  so  meagre  a  diet 
is  relieved  by  the  stimulus  of  large  draughts  of  the  light  wines 
of  the  country — in  general,  mixtures  deleterious  to  the  health, 
though  not  very  intoxicating.  Indeed,  one  cause  of  the  appa- 


324 


ITALIAN  SIGHTS  AND  PAPAL  PRINCIPLES. 


rent  sobriety  of  the  peasantry  is  said  to  be  their  inability  to  . 
swallow  enough  to  make  them  tipsy,  though  there  are  men 
among  them  that  will  drain  a  gallon  flask  at  a  sitting.  They 
drink  sufficiently,  however,  to  excite  crime  and  disorders. 
Their  temperance  may  be  considered  rather  a  passive  than 
active  virtue ;  though,  as  men  will  seek  artificial  stimulants, 
it  would  be  an  advantage  to  the  United  States  could  light 
wines  be  substituted  for  strong  liquors. 

The  effects  of  general  want  and  poverty  are  shown  among 
the  Italians  generally,  and  especially  the  Tuscans,  in  their 
short  stature,  heavy,  lifeless  look,  and  almost  haggard  appear¬ 
ance  ;  the  tout  ensemble  of  dress  and  mien  betokening  a  dispir¬ 
ited,  badly-fed,  and  worse-governed  race.  Their  numerous 
holidays  prevent  their  being  overworked  ;  but  the  pale,  spirit¬ 
less  faces,  bent  figures,  and  misshapen  shoulders  of  the  labor¬ 
ing  women  painfully  tell  their  lack  of  generous  diet  and 
healthful  employments.  I  never  walk  the  streets  of  Florence 
without  feeling  pained  at  the  sight  of  so  much  silent  misery 
that,  callous  as  it  were  to  its  own  wants,  passes  humbly  and 
painfully  by,  seemingly  without  pleasure  in  the  past  or  hope 
for  the  future.  It  really  appears  wrong  to  dress  well  and  walk 
erect  and  joyful  in  the  consciousness  of  health  and  the  bless¬ 
ings  of  Providence,  not  to  speak  of  the  ostentation  of  the  rich, 
in  contrast  with  the  blight  which  has  fallen  so  heavily  upon 
the  lives  of  so  many  of  our  fellow-beings,  through  centuries  of 
oppression  and  miscducation. 

It  is  difficult  to  procure  reliable  statistics  in  Italy,  but  the 
few  which  I  feel  authorized  te  give  will  show  not  only  the 
extent  of  poverty,  but  the  extent  of  charity  also  in  this  land. 
Indeed,  so  nume^  ms  and  so  richly  endowed  are  the  “  palaces” 
for  the  destitute,  as  the  poor-houses  and  hospitals  may  truly 
be  called,  that,  in  view  of  the  general  beggary  and  destitution, 
we  can  not  come  to  other  conclusion  than  that  they  overdo 


ITALIAN  SIGHTS  AND  PAPAL  PRINCIPLES. 


325 


their  own  charitable  design.  Too  much  assistance  has  made 
the  population  lazy  and  improvident.  They  rely  more  upon 
public  charity  than  private  enterprise  ;  consequently,  reform 
must  commence  with  them. 

In  1798  there  were  thirty  thousand  poor,  or  one  fifth  of  the 
population  of  Rome,  on  the  lists  of  the  curates  of  the  several 
parishes.  Under  the  administration  of  the  French  up  to  1814, 
the  proportion  had  been  diminished  to  one  ninth.  Since  that 
period  it  has  been  on  the  increase. 

There  are  in  Rome  nineteen  hospitals  for  the  treatment  of 
diseases.  One  of  them.  Saint  Roch,  is  for  the  reception  of 
pregnant  women  who  wish  to  be  confined  in  secret.  In  eight 
public  hospitals  the  average  number  of  sick  daily  is  about 
fourteen  hundred,  who  cost  nineteen  cents  a  day  each.  For 
every  five  patients  there  are  two  assistants  or  nurses,  at  the 
daily  wages  of  thirty-three  cents  each,  so  that  nearly  one  half 
of  the  revenues  of  the  hospitals  is  expended  on  the  well,  who, 
of  course,  are  greatly  interested  in  multiplying  them. 

The  hospital  of  the  Holy  Ghost  receives  all  bastards  with¬ 
out  question.  They  cost  Rome  yearly  fifty  thousand  dollars. 
There  are,  besides,  some  fourteen  semi-convents,  where  young 
girls  are  gratuitously  received  and  educated.  They  never 
leave  these  retreats  except  to  marry  or  become  nuns.  If  the 
former,  they  receive  a  dowry  of  thirty-five  dollars  ;  if  the  lat¬ 
ter,  fifty  dollars,  so  much  is  celibacy  in  Rome  held  in  honor 
above  matrimony.  As  an  anomaly,  however,  in  this  doctrine, 
there  exist  at  Rome,  and  in  Italy  generally,  dotal  institutions, 
which  annually  provide  a  considerable  number  of  poor  girls 
with  sufficient  dowries  to  tempt  offers  of  marriage.  The  lot¬ 
tery  is  also  a  recognized  institution  of  the  Church,  or,  more 
properly  speaking,  of  its  charity.  Benoit  XIY.  ordered  that  at 
each  drawing  five  maidens  should  receive  their  dowries  from 
as  many  winning  numbers ;  hence  the  fortunate  damsels  are 


326 


ITALIAN  SIGHTS  AND  PAPAL  PRINCIPLES. 


known,  not  by  their  Christian  names,  but  as  Miss  79,  or  Miss 
1025,  as  the  prize  numbers  may  prove.  The  hospitals  succor 
annually  about  five  thousand  poor,  at  an  expense  of  two  hund¬ 
red  thousand  dollars. 

The  Pope  has  various  resources  for  his  public  and  private 
benevolence.  The  Apostolic  Aumony  provides  him  with  about 
"  five  hundred  dollars  per  month  for  general  benevolence.  The 
Datary,  whence  briefs  and  bulls  are  issued,  a  sort  of  ecclesias¬ 
tical  chancellary,  which  employs  about  one  thousand  persons, 
and  receives  immense  sums  from  the  sale  of  dispensations,  in¬ 
dulgences,  and  the  usual  paper  traffic  of  Rome,  produces  the 
Pope  about  thirty  thousand  dollars.  An  acquaintance  of  mine 
paid  to  this  institution  two  thousand  francs  for  the  privilege 
to  marry  his  deceased  wife’s  sister.  Shops  for  the  sale  of 
dispensations  from  fasting,  and  all  the  numerous  requirements 
of  the  Church  of  Rome,  to  say  nothing  of  more  criminal  in¬ 
dulgences,  are  common.  The  lottery  produces  fifty  thousand 
dollars  ;  the  bureau  of  briefs  and  other  offices  some  six  thou¬ 
sand  more,  so  that  the  Pope,  unless  prodigal,  need  never  be 
empty-handed. 

Venice,  which  once  counted  nine  hundred  rich  and  noble 
families,  now  contains  scarcely  twelve  in  comfortable  circum¬ 
stances.  Some  thirty  others  live  obscurely  in  corners  or  lofts 
of  their  dilapidated  palaces,  depending  upon  the  scanty  rents 
received  from  strangers.  At  one  period,  more  than  two  thirds 
of  its  population,  or  seventy  thousand  souls,  required  public 
aid.  Milan,  to  the  stranger,  presents  neither  beggars  nor  pov¬ 
erty  ;  its  aspect  is  gay  and  brilliant,  but  this  is  owing  rather 
to  the  severe  measures  of  the  Austrian  police  to  prevent  men¬ 
dicity  than  to  real  prosperity.  Its  asylums  are  on  the  same 
scale  of  palatial  splendor  as  in  other  parts  of  Italy.  As  in 
Sardinia,  the  poor  are  removed  from  sight,  and  placed  in  build¬ 
ings  decorated  wdth  columns,  mosaics,  spacious  halls  and 


ITALIAN  SIGHTS  AND  FATAL  PRINCIPLES. 


327 


courts,  rivaling  in  architecture  the  stately  palaces  of  their  rul¬ 
ers  ;  which  cold  magnificence,  associated  often  with  forced 
labor,  they  would  gladly  exchange  for  a  gipsy  life  of  privation 
in  the  open  sunshine.  Two  thousand  eight  hundred  individ¬ 
uals,  according  to  a  Milanese  writer,  are  daily  succored  by  the 
houses  of  industry  of  St.  Vincent  and  St.  Marc  alone,  at  a  net 
annual  expense  of  eighty  thousand  dollars.  The  same  estab¬ 
lishments  at  Venice  are  more  prosperous,  costing  the  city  but 
about  five  thousand  dollars,  and  even  producing  a  saving,  if 
the  cleaning  and  lighting  of  the  streets,  with  which  they  are 
charged,  be*  comprised. 

Mendicity  in  the  beautiful  and  rich  Etruria  has  been  very 
appropriately  termed  by  Doctor  Purchetti  an  “  unarmed  brig¬ 
andage.”  Its  insolence  and  pertinacity,  coupled  with  the 
healthful  and  robust  appearance  of  the  majority  who  demand, 
rather  than  ask  alms,  have  won  for  it  this  character.  Even 
in  Florence,  where  alone  it  is  forbidden  by  law,  it  often  stalks 
the  streets  apparently  unmolested,  though  it  frequently  as¬ 
sumes  the  disguise  of  traffic  to  blind  the  eyes  of  the  police. 
Unlike  other  parts  of  Italy,  it  seldom  descends  to  wanton  ex¬ 
posure  of  ulcered  or  crippled  limbs,  or  other  disgusting  corpo¬ 
real  modes  of  exciting  compassion,  but  boldly  says  it  is  hun¬ 
gry,  and  simply  exclaims,  “Give  me  a  quattrino.”  Florence 
and  Arezzo  alone  have  organized  houses  for  the  unoccupied 
poor.  Elsewhere  they  are  at  the  mercy  of,  or  prey  unmolest¬ 
ed  upon,  individual  benevolence.  All  strangers  arriving  at 
Leghorn  are  taxed  nearly  one  dollar  a  head  for  the  poor.  But 
their  “  palace”  is  occupied  by  Austrian  soldiers,  wdiile,  in  rags 
and  vermin,  they  are  allowed  to  infest  the  streets  with  more 
the  air  of  nobles  than  of  beggars.  Such  sights  are  not  grate¬ 
ful  to  the  eyes  of  a  court ;  consequently,  when  the  Grand 
Duke  goes  to  the  baths  of  Lucca  or  elsewhere,  the  police  are 
active  in  clearing  the  roads  of  a  class  of  his  subjects  which  re- 


128 


ITALIAN  SIGHTS  AND  PAPAL  PRINCIPLES. 


fleet  no  credit  on  his  government.  After  his  departure,  they 
make  up  their  temporary  losses  by  harassing  strangers  -with 
twofold  energy.  In  the  capital,  however,  the  severity  of  the 
law,  which  inflicts  imprisonment  or  fines  for  the  first  offenses, 
and  perpetual  imprisonment,  with  forced  labor,  for  renewed 
transgressions,  serves  in  some  degree  to  abate  the  nuisance. 

Formerly  there  were  three  hundred  churches  and  convents 
in  the  little  city  of  Florence,  owning  the  larger  part  of  its  real 
estate.  Thanks  to  the  enlightened  Ferdinand  and  the  French, 
the  greater  part  of  these  abodes  of  idleness  were  suppressed. 
Even  now,  however,  the  Church  owns  a  large  piwportion  of 
the  city.  The  numerous  heraldic  devices  of  the  lamb  and 
cross,  to  he  seen  on  so  many  of  the  houses  and  palaces  of  the 
city,  indicate  the  wealth  of  the  Cathedral  alone.  At  present 
there  are  seventeen  convents  of  men  and  fourteen  of  females, 
besides  seven  houses  of  refuge  for  young  girls  under  the  charge 
of  nuns.  Of  hospitals  of  all  kinds  there  are  eight  or  ten  ;  that 
of  Santa  Maria  Nuova,  founded  in  1287,  being  one  of  the  finest 
and  best  organized  in  Europe,  and  succoring  annually  more 
than  three  thousand  sick  of  both  sexes. 

In  this  hospital  is  to  he  seen  the  museum  of  the  late  Profess¬ 
or  Segato,  who  discovered  the  process  of  petrifying  animal 
substances,  so  that,  while  they  retained  their  natural  colors 
and  shapes,  they  became  as  hard  as  stone.  The  Church,  as 
usual,  interfered  with  his  art,  on  the  ground  that  it  was  con¬ 
trary  to  the  scriptural  doctrine  of  “  into  dust  shalt  thou  return.” 
Consequently,  unable  to  prosecute  the  discoveries  farther,  he 
soon  after  died,  leaving  to  the  world  this  unique  museum  as 
the  evidence  of  his  success,  and  to  tantalize  science  with  re- 

4 

grets  for  the  lost  secret. 

It  comprises  every  portion  of  the  human  body  transformed 
to  stone,  destined  to  endure  as  long  as  the  world  itself,  if  not 
ground  to  pieces  by  violence.  There  are  two  tables,  one  fin- 


ITALIAN  SIGHTS  AND  PAPAL  PRINCIPLES. 


329 


ished  and  polished,  the  other  incomplete,  made  of  mosaics 
formed  by  sections  of  human  bones,  brain,  lungs,  blood-ves¬ 
sels,  intestines,  and  muscles,  as  firm  as  marble,  showing  the 
internal  structure  of  each,  but  resembling  colored  stones. 
Without  an  explanation,  every  visitor  would  presume  them  to 
have  come  from  some  stone  mosaic  manufactory,  for  they  are 
symmetrically  arranged  in  squares,  with  the  great  variety  of 
colors  nicely  graduated.  Different  portions  of  the  human 
body,  exhibiting  the  internal  anatomy,  are  so  perfectly  petri¬ 
fied  as  to  form  perfect  objects  of  study  for  the  medical  student. 
Even  morbid  anatomy  was  subjected  with  entire  success  to 
this  process.  Animals  of  all  kinds,  reptiles,  chickens  in  and 
out  of  the  egg — in  short,  nothing  that  had  warm  blood  was 
capable  of  resisting  his  petrifying  touch.  The  beauty  of  his 
art  was  that  it  preserved  the  life-like  appearance  and  color  of 
the  animal ;  hence,  for  anatomical  and  natural  history  muse¬ 
ums,  his  discovery  was  invaluable.  The  student  had  before 
him  the  real  object  of  his  study,  perfect  as  in  life,  without  any 
of  the  inconveniencies  and  imperfections  attending  waxen  rep¬ 
resentations  and  stuffed  or  spirit-preserved  specimens.  The 
Roman  Church,  above  all  others,  did  wrong  to  discourage  the 
art.  Next  to  medical  colleges,  it  is  the  largest  dealer  in  dead 
men’s  bones.  What  an  improvement  it  would  have  been,  in¬ 
stead  of  exhibiting  a  knee-pan  in  a  vial,  or  a  dried  skull  in  a 
gold  case,  to  have  held  up  for  adoration  an  entire  saint  as  fresh 
as  in  life.  All  skepticism  in  relics  would  then  disappear,  for, 
however  easy  it  may  be  to  substitute  one  bone  for  another, 
there  could  be  no  possibility  of  destroying  personal  identity. 
The  stone  saint  would  be  the  actual  image  of  the  live  saint ; 
no  daguerreotype  could  be  half  so  exact ;  and  when  not  in 
use,  could  be  quietly  laid  by  on  the  shelf,  as  is  frequently  done 
in  life. 

What  a  gallery  of  great  men  might  not  be  bodily  perpetu- 


330 


ITALIAN  SIGHTS  AND  PAPAL  PRINCIPLES. 


ated  to  the  world  by  this  art!  Who  would  not  now  like  to 
see  the  real  Homer,  Socrates,  or  Caesar,  not  in  cold  marble,  but 
looking  as  if  they  merely  slept,  their  actual  flesh  and  blood 
stiff  and  erect  before  us  ?  The  sculptor  would  have  aban¬ 
doned  his  art  in  despair.  I  can  not  say  that  I  should  look 
complacently  on  the  process  as  applied  to  one’s  own  family. 
Perhaps  the  relations  of  Homer,  Socrates,  and  Caesar  would 
have  had  similar  objections,  and  have  preferred  the  funeral 
pile  to  the  adamantine  embalmment.  There  is,  however,  in 
this  museum  the  head  of  a  young  girl,  with  long  flaxen  hair 
of  remarkable  beauty,  as  soft  and  tress-like  as  in  life.  Be¬ 
longing  to  this  head  is  a  virgin  bosom,  snow-white,  and  of  a 
perfection  of  form  that  nature  seldom  equals,  and  art  never 
surpasses.  Powers’s  Greek  Slave  or  the  Venus  de  Medici  could 
exchange  busts  with  this  maiden  without  loss,  so  exquisite  are 
its  proportions  and  so  pure  its  outlines.  Here,  then,  exists  a 
figure  which  women  will  envy  and  men  admire  through  all 
time,  as  cold  and  hard  as  flint,  yet  warming  the  feelings  with 
love  and  pity  for  the  fate  of  one  so  young  and  beautiful.  All 
that  is  known  of  her  is  that  she  was  found  dead  with  others 
under  the  roof  pf  a  church  that  fell  in,  and  Segato  possessed 
himself  of  her  corpse. 

Hospitals  for  foundlings  appear  to  be  a  peculiar  charity  of 
Homan  Catholic  countries.  They  indicate  both  great  distress 
and  a  low  scale  of  morality.  Increasing  as  they  must,  from 
the  facilities  they  afford  to  illegitimacy  and  concubinage,  evils 
scarcely  less  than  those  they  seek  to  remedy,  Protestants 
should  be  cautious  in  imitating  them.  Indeed,  in  countries 
of  their  origin  they  are  defended  only  as  a  choice  between  the 
infanticide  1  abandonment  which  it  is  their  peculiar  prov¬ 
ince  to  prevent  and  relieve.  Both  legitimate  and  illegitimate 
infants  find  a  home  in  these  asylums  to  the  number  of  several 
thousands  annually.  When  of  sufficient  age,  they  are  placed 


ITALIAN  SIGHTS  AND  PAPAL  PRINCIPLES. 


331 


in  the  families  of  the  peasants,  who  receive  a  trifling  sum  for 
their  maintenance,  which  ceases  when  the  children  are  able 
to  earn  something  for  themselves.  If  the  girls  marry,  they 
are  entitled  to  a  dowry  of  about  thirty  dollars,  but  after  they 
have  left  the  hospital  and  are  at  service,  they  frequently  con¬ 
tinue  to  obtain  this  sum  without  the  necessary  condition, 
through  others  to  whom  they  furnish  their  papers  for  that 
purpose.  In  1825  there  were  10,194  infants  received  into  the 
several  foundling  hospitals  of  Tuscany.  The  number  increased 
to  12,494  in  1834,  owing,  in  part,  to  the  increase  of  the  popu¬ 
lation.  In  1841  the  family  of  the  Royal  Hospital  of  Innocents 
of  Florence  alone  numbered  7511,  a  large  number  of  whom 
are  legitimate  children,  abandoned  from  cause  of  poverty  by 
their  parents.  They  can,  however,  at  any  time  reclaim  them 
by  reimbursing  the  hospital  for  the  expenses  incurred.  A  con¬ 
siderable  numb;er,  one  in  sixteen,  are  thus  withdrawn,  but, 
with  all  the  care  and  kindness  bestowed  upon  those  who  re¬ 
main,  their  lot  is  a  hard  one.  I  had  a  domestic  once  who 
knew  nothing  more  of  her  childhood  than  that  she  was  found 
in  the  streets  and  placed  in  one  of  these  hospitals,  where,  after 
receiving  the  usual  fare  and  education  for  a  number  of  years, 
she  was  sent  out  into  the  world  to  gain  her  own  subsistence. 
She  knew  neither  parent  nor  relative — in  fact,  was  perfectly 
alone,  united  to  society  only  by  the  indissoluble  chain  of  servi¬ 
tude  ;  for  what  hope  has  one  of  these  public  orphans  to  contract 
ties  of  family,  when  even  noble-born  maidens  without  dowries 
are  compelled  to  pine  in  solitude  or  seek  religious  consolation 
in  cloisters  ?  She  was  humble  and  grateful,  but  sad  ;  feeling 
deeply  her  forlorn  situation,  aggravated  as  it  was  by  a  pulmo¬ 
nary  complaint,. which  threatened  soon  to  terminate  her  sor¬ 
rows  in  life,  and  unite  her  with  Lazarus  in  Abraham’s  bosom. 
I  know  not  who  are  most  to  be  pitied,  the  parent  driven  by 
shame  or  poverty  to  violate  the  purest  instincts  of  human  na- 


ITAlJAlN  EIGHTS  AND  PAPAJ.  PllINCIPLEii. 


ture,  or  their  offspring,  fatherless  and  motherless,  knowing  no 
kin,  nursed  during  infancy  by  hirelings,  or  else  confined  with¬ 
in  the  walls  of  a  charitable  institution,  deprived  of  the  sacred 
joys  of  a  home,  until  bone  and  muscle  are  sufficiently  grown 
lor  them  to  take  their  places  as  “  the  drawers  of  water  and 
hewers  of  stone”  for  their  more  fortunate  brethren.  Vice 
brings  with  it  another  punishment.  Whoever  has  noticed 
these  orphans  will  have  perceived  that  they  appear  like  an 
inferior  race  of  humanity  compared  with  the  civilized  Euro¬ 
pean  type.  Their  faces  and  forms  seem  as  if  run  in  one 
mould,  with  dull,  unintellectual,  almost  imbecile  expressions, 
and  short,  stubby  figures,  like  those  of  well-fed  swine.  After 
looking  at  these  children,  I  ceased  to  wonder  at  the  stunted, 
haggard,  lifeless  population  so  often  seen  in  the  streets. 

Naples,  in  its  “  Albergo  dei  Poveri,”  possesses  one  of  the 
most  sumptuous  poor-houses  in  existence  ;  one  immense  estab¬ 
lishment,  accommodating  upward  of  three  thousand  paupers 
of  both  sexes,  in  which  there  are  not  only  work-shops  for  the 
fabrication  of  silks,  cotton,  laces,  the  cutting  of  coral,  and  other 
trades,  but  also  schools  of  music,  design,  arithmetic,  and  other 
branches  of  knowledge,  besides  a  printing-office,  type-foundry, 
and  other  arts,  so  as  to  afford  suitable  employments  and  in¬ 
struction  for  all  capacities.  Notwithstanding  this  model  es¬ 
tablishment  and  numerous  others,  whose  annual  revenues 
amount  to  nearly  two  millions  and  five  hundred  thousand  dol¬ 
lars,  Naples  is  infested  with  an  idle,  begging  population,  to  re¬ 
form  which  would  require  all  the  energy  of  well-directed  lib¬ 
eral  institutions,  or  else  a  severity  which  even  its  heartless 
despotism  dare  not  exercise. 

There  is  an  important  distinction  between  Roman  Catholic 
and  Protestant  benevolence  in  modes  of  action.  Both  are  com¬ 
prehensive,  self-denying,  laborious,  and  unwearied.  The  for¬ 
mer,  however,  partakes  of  the  parade  and  ostentation  of  the 


ITALIAN  SIGHTS  AND  PAPAL  PRINCIPLES. 


333 


Church  which  controls  and  directs  its  operations.  It  delights 
in  uniforms,  chantings,  torch-lights,  and  masquerading.  When 
it  visits  the  sick  or  buries  the  dead,  it  puts  on  its  robes  of  of¬ 
fice.  With  all  its  apparent  humility,  it  blazons  forth  its  good 
deeds  to  the  world  by  a  state  and  trappings  that  announce  its 
errand,  and  proclaim  its  subserviency  to  the  Holy  See.  To  re¬ 
lieve  is  the  secondary,  to  proselyte  is  the  primary  object  of  its 
creed.  Its  various  associations  form  the  militia  of  popery,  and, 
owing  to  their  real  virtues,  they  are  the  most  successful  of  its 
soldiers  in  extending  its  conquests.  No  one  can  meet  the  Ro¬ 
man  “  Brethren  of  the  Dead,”  whose  office  is  to  bury  the  de¬ 
serted  victims  of  contagion,  see  the  mournful  costume  of  the 
Florentine  “  Brethren  of  Pity”  in  their  more  comprehensive 
errands  of  mercy,  or  watch  the  noiseless  steps  of  the  French 
“  Sisters  of  Charity,”  as  they  glide,  like  ministering  angels,  to 
the  hearthstones  of  poverty  or  the  bedsides  of  the  sick  and  dy¬ 
ing,  without  feeling  his  heart  respond  to  the  sublime  doctrine 
of  the  universal  brotherhood  of  man,  and  involuntarily  rever¬ 
encing  that  form  of  Christianity  which  thus  manifests  its  be¬ 
nevolence  to  the  world.  But  is  there  not  more  real  sublimity 
in  the  silent,  humble  walk  of  Protestant  benevolence — the  do¬ 
ing  good  in  secret — than  in  all  the  mighty  machinery  of  Rome  ? 
The  one  takes  hold  of  the  sentiment,  and  exalts  the  imagina¬ 
tion ;  it  proclaims  its  work  and  demands  its  tribute.  The 
other  also  has  in  its  ranks  Sisters  of  Charity  and  Brethren  of 
Mercy  as  devoted  and  unwearied  as  any  in  the  ranks  of  Rome. 
But  they  go  forth  on  their  daily  rounds  of  Christian  love  un¬ 
heralded  by  chants,  and  undisguised  in  the  robes  of  state  ;  less 
known  to  the  public  than  if,  in  their  spiritual  pride,  they  doffed 
their  usual  habiliments  to  bury  themselves  and  their  good 
works  in  those  lugubrious  costumes  with  which  Romanism 
conceals  all  but  the  eyes,  for  fear  that  the  right  hand  shall 
know  what  the  left  doeth,  whilt^  at  the  same  time  they  bid  the 
world  to  do  them  reverence. 


334 


ITALIAN  SIGHTS  AND  PAPAL  PRINCIPLES. 


Protestantism  washes  no  pilgrims’  feet,  and  feeds  no  pau¬ 
pers  in  the  pride  of  charity  amid  the  splendors  of  a  dominant 
hierarchy.  It  makes  no  theatrical  exhibition  of  its  benevo¬ 
lence,  though  its  English  form  delights  too  much  in  good  din¬ 
ners.  Its  benevolence  flows  not  at  the  command  of  a  human 
“Holy  Father,”  directed  by  one  fallible  will  toward  one  infal¬ 
lible  purpose,  but  is  the  offspring  of  individual  hearts,  con¬ 
centrated  by  love,  for  the  simple  purpose  of  visiting  “  the  wid¬ 
ows  and  fatherless  in  their  afflictioik.” 

Men  see  not  the  Protestant ‘Brethren  of  Mercy  as  they  pass 
by,  for  they  are  like  other  men ;  neither  do  women  kneel  on 
stony  pavements  when  the  Protestant  clergyman  carries  hope 
to  the  dying,  for  his  presence  is  not  pompously  announced  by 
a  long  train  of  priestlings  in  gaudy  robes,  with  the  tinkling  of 
bells,  and  the  armed  soldiers,  who  guard  the  Roman  minister 
as  he  bears  the  body  and  blood  of  the  Prince  of  Peace  on  his 
way  to  absolve  dying  sinners ;  nor  do  our  Sisters  of  Charity 
wear  other  garb  than  that  in  which  they  so  faithfully  perform 
their  duties  as  Christian  mothers. 

Protestant  benevolence  appeals  directly  to  “  Our  Father  in 
Heaven”  to  sustain  and  direct  its  energies ;  it  acknowledges 
its  accountability  to  the  public,  from  which  it  derives  its  mate¬ 
rial  aid ;  and  in  all  points  it  seeks  to  dispense  its  bounties  as 
Providence  extends  its  blessings,  silently  and  effectively,  to  all 
who  hunger  and  thirst.  Both  are  the  children  of  Christianity. 
Which  does  it  most  honor,  and  partakes  largest  of  its  spirit, 
the  records  of  eternity  alone  may  decide.  Would  that,  while 
both  remain  on  earth,  their  rivalry  were  solely  in  provoking 
«ach  other  to  good  deeds  ! 

Roman  Catholic  cities,  in  their  primary  aspect,  present  a 
higher  appearance  of  public  morality  than  Protestant  capitals. 
But  few  public  women  are  met  in  their  streets ;  drunkenness 
seems  rare  ;  and  there  is  a  general  quiet  and  lethargy,  the  ex- 


ITALIAN  SIGHTS  AND  PAPAL  PRINCIPLES, 


335 


act  reverse  of  the  bustle  and  enterprise  of  those  towns  that 
acknowledge  Protestantism.  Nowhere  is  this  parallel  more 
strikingly  shown  than  between  Geneva  and  Lucerne,  Florence 
and  New  York,  or  Rome  and  London.  This  external  morality 
is  readily  explained. 

While  the  grosser  forms  of  prostitution  are  not  so  openly  ex¬ 
hibited  in  papal  cities  as  in  Protestant,  the  distinction  between 
virtue  and  vice  is  much  less  rigorously  drawn.  The  Roman 
clergy  are  able  to  repress  it  outwardly,  but  it  extends  inward¬ 
ly.  Society  in  general  is  corrupt,  while  the  streets  are  com¬ 
paratively  pure.  The  forced  celibacy  of  the  priesthood  ever 
has  produced,  and  will  continue  to,  while  it  exists,  a  vast 
amount  of  hidden  concubinage.  The  religious  restraints  and 
expenses  of  marriage  produce  more  that  is  open,  while  the 
general  laxity  of  public  opinion  tolerates  corrupt  unions  that 
in  England  and  the  United  States  would  bring  upon  the  of¬ 
fenders  the  penalties  of  law  and  expulsion  from  society.  Pos¬ 
sibly  there  ure  fewer  public  prostitutes  in  strictly  Roman 
Catholic  towns  than  in  Protestant,  but  as  an  offset,  the  morals 
of  their  women  are  looser,  and  afford  wider  scope  for  intrigue, 
so  that  licentiousness  is  not  concentrated,  as  in  general  with 
us,  to  a  class  of  degraded  females,  and  reduced  to  the  baser 
condition  of  traffic.  Our  streets,  too,  are  freed  from  a  nuisance 
which  no  traveler  escapes  from  in  Italy.  Pimps  dog  his  steps 
every  where,  and  though  he  may  escape  the  sight  of  loose 
women,  he  is  constantly  haunted  by  the  obscene  importunities 
of  their  beastly  male  agents. 

Intoxication  is  rarer,  because  strong  liquors  are  not  so  avail¬ 
able.  There  is,  however,  more  general  drinking,  and  perhaps, 
in  the  mass,  more  aggregate  vice  and  misery  from  this  cause 
than  in  America.  In  Italy  all  drink  ;  teetotalism  is  unknown. 
If  we  possess  a  confirmed  race  of  drunkards,  they  do  not  un¬ 
derstand  the  principle  of  temperance ;  so  that  while  they  fail 


336 


ITALIAN  SIGHTS  AND  PAPAL  PRINCIPLES 


to  show  as  many  repulsive  specimens  of  this  vice  as  we,  they 
exhibit  more  general  misery  and  degradation. 


AN  ITALIAN  WINE-SHOP. 


The  average  morality  of  the  Italian  races,  in  other  respects, 
I  consider  as  beneath  the  American.  Why  is  it  that  the  lower 
story  of  every  house  and  palace  is  fortified  by  iron  gratings 
and  massive  doors,  so  as  to  resemble  more  a  prison  than  pri- 


ITALIAN  SIGHTS  AND  PAPAL  PRINCIPLES. 


337 


vate  dwellings,  if  it  be  not  from  the  general  sense  of  insecurity 
to  property  ?  Petty  dishonesty,  pilferings,  and  what  may  be 
comprehended  under  the  general  term  of  knavery,  extend  to 
degrees  of  society  whose  social  position  would  apparently  place 
them  above  all  risk  of  taint.  The  servility  which  panders  to 
vice  and  clutches  at  gain,  through  ignominy  or  disregard  of 
self-respect,  is  painfully  apparent.  Female  servants  kiss  the 
hands  of  their  masters,  and  obsequiousness  is  the  chief  recom¬ 
mendation  in  domestics.  There  is  much  kindly  feeling  in  the 
relation  of  servant  and  master  in  Italy,  it  is  true,  to  the  credit 
of  both  parties  ;  but  the  between  the  two  is  an  impassa¬ 
ble  one — its  boundaries  are  those  of  perpetual  caste. 

Italians  are  not  educated  up  to  the  Protestant  standard  of 
truth  and  honor.  As  beggary  with  the  lower  classes  carries 
with  it  no  shame,  so  falsehood  among  the  higher  would  not  be 
deemed  a  vice.  The  multiplicity  of  newspapers  in  the  United 
States  prevents  any  crime  from  being  long  hid.  Every  thing 
which  in  any  way  interests  the  public  is  spread  before  it,  from 
one  extremity  of  the  Union  to  the  other,  with  the  rapidity  of 
thought.  In  consequence,  all  our  evil  deeds  are  dragged  to 
light,  and  every  day  develops,  as  it  were,  some  new  crime. 
At  the  first  glance  it  would  appear  as  if  we  were  a  peculiarly 
criminal  race  ;  but  when  we  consider  that  the  newspapers  re¬ 
flect  as  a  looking-glass  the  moral  condition  of  a  population  of 
twenty-five  millions,  our  surprise  is  rather  at  the  paucity  than 
the  extent  of  crime.  Italy  presents  nothing  of  the  kind.  Its 
population  is  not  one  of  readers.  Journals  are  small,  scarce, 
and  restricted  to  only  what  jealous  governments  permit  to  be 
known.  They  are  but  an  indifferent  clew  to  the  moral  con¬ 
dition  of  Italians.  Crimes  may  be  common  or  rare,  and  noth¬ 
ing  be  heard  of  them  away  from  their  immediate  circle.  Still, 
I  do  not  believe  that  the  Italians  are  given  to  the  cold-blooded 
atrocities  which  figure  not  unfrequently  in  the  criminal  calen- 

P 


338 


ITALIAN  SIGHTS  AND  PAPAL  PRINCIPLES 


dars  of  England  and  America.  At  all  events,  we  rarely  hear 
of  coolly-planned  murders  for  the  sake  of  booty  ;  and  yet  brig¬ 
ands  and  assassinations  figure  largely  in  Italian  tales.  The 
Italian  kills  in  warm  blood,  or  in  his  profession  of  a  “  bravo.” 
He  uses  his  knife,  particularly  the  Roman,  as  an  Anglo-Saxon 
does  his  fists.  It  is  his  national  weapon,  and  the  idea  of  cour¬ 
age  is  particularly  connected  with  a  prompt  thrust  in  revenge 


ITALIAN  SIGHTS  AND  PAPAL  PRINCIPLES. 


339 


of  real  or  fancied  wrong.  The  Italian  is  like  the  Indian  in  re¬ 
spect  to  his  mode  of  retribution.  He  seeks  it  in  the  way  in 
which  he  himself  is  safest ;  and  what  Northern  minds  would 
consider  as  base  and  cowardly,  he  considers  as  courageous  and 
justifiable.  All  who  have  read  the  appeals  of  Mazzini  to  his 
countrymen  will  not  fail  to  perceive  that  he  relies  chiefly  on 
treachery  and  assassination — a  wholesale  repetition  of  the  Si¬ 
cilian  vespers — to  bring  about  a  revolution.  The  criminal  sta¬ 
tistics  of  Rome  would  show  that  he  does  not  appeal  to  their 
skill  in  the  use  of  their  national  weapon  without  reason. 

During  the  last  century,  the  average  of  murders  in  Rome, 
with  a  population  of  one  hundred  and  fifty  thousand  souls, 
was  five  or  six  a  day,  and  on  one  occasion  fourteen.  While 
occupied  by  the  French,  there  were  in  a  single  day  one  hund¬ 
red  and  twenty  assassinations;  and  as  late  as  1828  they  av¬ 
eraged  one  daily.  A  chapel  of  the  Madonna  in  the  church 
of  the  Augustins  is  hung  about  with  knives,  dirks,  and  other 
murderous  instruments,  suspended  there  by  their  owners,  at 
the  order  of  their  confessor,  as  a  condition  of  absolution  and 
evidence  of  pardon  of  their  crimes. 

The  streets  of  Rome  are  not  safe  at  the  later  hours  of  night, 
even  now,  for  any  one  who  has  aught  about  him  to  tempt  the 
cupidity  of  its  highwaymen.  Roman  friends  of  mine  are  ac¬ 
customed  to  place  their  watches  in  their  boots  when  out  late 
at  night.  Every  housekeeper  will  tell  you  the  risks  they  run 
in  not  keeping  the  strictest  watch  over  their  premises ;  and 
any  one’s  experience  in  visiting  Italian  families  will  convince 
him  that  they  have  more  confidence  in  their  portcullis  doors 
and  massive  gratings  than  in  either  the  honesty  of  their  coun¬ 
trymen  or  the  guardianship  of  the  police.  It  is  customary, 
when  a  visitor  calls,  to  reconnoitre,  either  through  a  loop-hole 
or  an  upper  window,  so  as  to  ascertain  his  quality  and  busi¬ 
ness  before  withdrawing  the  bolt.  Fear  and  suspicion  are 


340 


ITALIAN  SIGHTS  AND  PAPAL  PRINCIPLES. 


manifested  to  great  extent  in  the  domestic  arrangements  of 
Italians,  and  with  reason,  for  in  no  country  is  there  more  sym¬ 
pathy  felt  for  the  bandit.  As  he  protects  the  poor,  he  is  con¬ 
sidered  more  as  their  champion  than  a  criminal.  The  ranks 
of  highwaymen  are  often  recruited  from  the  disaffected  toward 
the  government,  whose  oppressions  force  them,  as  it  were,  into 
open  hostility.  Hence  they  partake  in  part  of  the  character 
of  patriots ;  and,  even  with  the  aid  of  French  and  Austrian 
troops,  Italy  finds  it  no  easy  task  to  keep  her  roads  and  cities 
safe  for  the  traveler.  Judge,  then,  what  would  be  the  condi¬ 
tion  of  the  country  were  its  five  hundred  thousand  bayonets 
reduced  to  the  number  that  compose  the  army  of  the  United 
States ! 

The  chiefs  of  the  Roman  brigands,  from  their  audacity  and 
the  extent  of  their  crimes,  have  ranked  with  the  vulgar  as  he¬ 
roes.  The  Roman  government,  unable  to  cope  with  them, 
has,  after  they  had  glutted  themselves  with  plunder,  pardoned 
and  pensioned  them  to  keep  the  peace. 

One  of  the  most  noted  was  Gasparone,  who  began  his  ca¬ 
reer  by  killing  his  confessor  for  refusing  to  absolve  him  for  a 
robbery.  Yet  so  scrupulous  was  he  in  the  performance  of 
those  religious  rites  that  ignorant  Romanism  substitutes  for 
spiritual  worship,  that  he  acquired  with  the  country  people  a 
reputation  for  sanctity,  particularly  for  his  devotion  to  Saint 
Anthony,  and  his  careful  abstinence  from  murders  on  Sundays 
and  Church  festivals. 

Another,  Gobertino  by  name,  killed  during  his  career,  with 
his  own  hand,  nine  hundred  and  sixty-four  adults  and  six  in¬ 
fants  ;  regretting  only  on  his  death-bed  that  he  had  not  been 
able  to  make  up  the  number  to  a  thousand.  Aronzo  Albagna 
massacred  his  entire  family,  including  his  father,  mother,  two 
brothers,  and  sister.  America  and  England  may  contain  crim¬ 
inals  capable  of  rivaling  these  exploits,  but  it  is  certain  that 


ITALIAN  SIGHTS  AND  PAPAL  PRINCIPLES 


341 


the  opportunity  never  would  be  allowed  them.  It  is  rare  in 
either  country  that  a  villain  gets  beyond  his  first  great  crime. 


My  object  in  presenting  this  unfavorable  summary  of  Italian 
character  is  to  show  to  what  extent,  in  comparison  with  Prot¬ 
estantism,  I  consider  Romanism  to  be  responsible  for  it,  both 
for  what  it  has  actually  done  and  what  it  has  failed  to  do.  If 
such  are  the  results  where  Romanism  is  supreme,  are  not 
other  nations  in  which  it  seeks  to  find  sway  warranted  in 


342 


ITALlAiN  SIGHTS  AND  PAPAL  PRINCIPLES. 


viewing  it,  both  in  a  political  and  moral  sense,  with  a  jealous 
eye  ?  If  there  be  in  the  institutions  of  Protestant  countries 
any  superiority  over  those  of  Roman  Catholic,  it  is  owing  to 
the  purer  faith,  greater  knowledge,  and  more  elevated  view  of 
human  rights  which  they  have  developed.  Protestantism  is 
j) regressive.  It  looks  both  to  the  temporal  and  eternal  wel¬ 
fare  of  the  individual.  What  it  claims  for  itself  it  allows  to 
others,  asking  deference  only  to  civil  law,  while  creeds  are  left 
intact.  It  seeks  to  convert  the  understanding,  and  not  to  ter¬ 
rify  the  nerves  and  lull  them  into  a  false  repose. 

Romanism,  on  the  contrary,  is  the  opposite  of  all  this.  She 
forbids  liberty  of  speech  and  freedom  of  the  press.  She  re¬ 
fuses  the  appeal  to  the  Bible.  Intolerance  is  her  constant 
principle.  By  one  weapon  or  another,  by  being  all  things  to 
all  men,  by  persuasion  when  possible,  by  force  when  she  has 
the  power,  she  seeks  to  bind  all  nations  to  her  spiritual  des¬ 
potism.  Romanism  and  republicanism  are  antagonistic  poAV- 
ers.  When  together,  one  or  the  other  must  succumb.  In  the 
United  States,  thus  far,  Protestantism  has  succeeded  in  ex¬ 
tracting  the  sting  from  her  enemy.  There  are  only  two  pow¬ 
ers  equal  to  cope  with  her :  democracy  on  the  one  hand, 
strong  in  its  own  rights,  and  enlightened  as  to  its  true  mission 
to  elevate  mankind  by  the  gradual  spread  of  liberty  sanctified 
by  religion  and  knowledge  ;  on  the  other,  a  despotism  capable 
of  controlling  elements  as  powerful  as  its  own.  In  England 
and  America  it  is  kept  within  restricted  limits  by  the  superior 
power  of  an  enlightened  public  opinion.  In  France  it  has 
again  become  restless  and  aggressive  ;  not  content  with  equal¬ 
ity,  it  seeks  supremacy.  Whether  the  infidelity  of  France  will 
be  able  to  retain  the  toleration  it  has  permitted  to  all  sects  in 
the  contest  with  the  subtleties  and  fanaticism  of  popery,  re¬ 
mains  to  be  seen.  The  policy  for  Romanism  is  to  demand  for 
itself  all  that  it  refuses  to  another :  the  golden  rule  has  no 


ITALIAN  SIGHTS  AND  PAPAL  PRINCIPLES. 


343 


place  in.  its  creed.  Protestantism  asks  nothing  more  than  that 
all  sects  should  be  placed  on  an  equal  basis,  and  left  to  find 
their  way  to  the  hearts  of  men  through  the  paths  of  knowl¬ 
edge  and  truth.  In  doing  this,  she  disarms  herself  of  weapons 
that  Romanism  unscrupulously  uses  to  her  injury.  They  do  not 
meet  on  equal  terms  except  on  Protestant  grounds.  When  the 
Pope  rules,  the  tongue  is  tied  and  the  limbs  fettered  if  they  do 
not  acknowledge  his  supremacy.  It  is  a  mistake  to  suppose 
that  the  attacks  of  popery  are  confined  to  Protestant  countries. 
Her  power  has  been  checked  repeatedly  by  Catholic  princes, 
and  equally  against  them  she  wages  endless  war  on  every 
point  that  crosses  her  selfish  interests.  Venice  was  free  and 
powerful  while  she  was  tolerant  and  uncompromising  to  the 
demands  of  Rome  ;  Florence  populous  and  prosperous  until 
her  rulers  became  priests  and  her  interests  confided  to  Rome. 
All  free  communities  that  have  trusted  to  her  for  salvation 
have  fallen  by  her  arts.  There  is  no  hope  for  Italy  while 
popery  exists  as  a  dominant  creed.  It  opposes  an  insurmount¬ 
able  barrier  to  freedom  and  knowledge.  None  are  more  pain¬ 
fully  convinced  of  this  than  enlightened  Italians  themselves. 
Piedmont  is  now  a  rising  state,  but  every  step  of  her  progress 
is  one  of  contest  with  the  Pope.  In  Spain,  popery  refuses  a 
Christian  burial  to  a  Protestant.  In  Germany  and  Franee  she 
calls  marriages  concubinage  when  not  sanetified  before  her 
altars  with  gifts  to  her  priests.  But  I  have  already  pursued 
this  topic  sufficiently  far  to  bear  my  witness  against  the  giant 
cause  of  the  darkness  and  ignorance  that  overspread  so  large 
a  portion  of  our  globe. 

One  topic  which  enlists  the  sympathies  of  liberty  every 
where  still  remains.  Will  Italy  ever  become  a  united,  free 
country,  or  must  she  ever  remain,  in  the  words  of  Metternich, 
merely  a  geographical  idea?  Nature  evidently  intended  her 
for  a  unity.  This,  however,  has  never  been  accomplished. 


344 


ITALIAN  SIGHTS  AND  PAPAL  PRINCIPLES. 


Rome  founded  her  dominion  over  isolated  cities  and  kingdoms  ; 
she  melted  them  in  the  crucible  of  her  power,  but  did  not  cast 

•I 

them  out  a  united  state.  Romans,  not  Italians,  ruled  the 
world.  When  Rome  fell,  Italy  resumed  her  previous  condi¬ 
tion  of  rival  communities  engaged  in  ceaseless  contests.  Com¬ 
merce  and  war  developed  wealth  and  energy.  Italy  became 
great  from  the  genius  and  arts  of  her  hostile  sons.  She  con¬ 
tained  within  herself  all  the  elements  of  the  first  jDower  on 
earth  but  union.  Her  commercial  cities  were  each  worth  the 
ransom  of  kingdoms.  They  conquered  territories  and  spread 
their  power  abroad,  while  neglecting  to  insure  it  at  home. 
All  paid  homage  to  Rome  as  their  spiritual  head.  Then  was 
the  time  for  a  patriot  Pope  to  have  healed  their  dissensions 
and  united  them  as  one  people.  But  no !  The  Popes  were 
alive  only  to  the  extension  of  their  own  petty  temporal  sover¬ 
eignties.  They  esteemed  it  a  higher  honor  to  rule  over  a  few 
cities,  wasted  with  fire  and  sword  at  their  command,  than  to 
be  the  saviors  of  Italy.  To  this  end  they  sowed  fresh  dissen¬ 
sions  ;  they  repeatedly  leagued  with  transalpine  enemies ;  they 
exterminated  liberty,  and  finally  became  the  chief  among  the 
many  sad  causes  which  have  contributed  to  make  Italy  what 
we  now  find  her — the  mere  foot-ball  of  European  policy. 

Besides  popery,  Italy  is  held  down  by  twofold  bonds.  First, 
the  policy  of  France  and  Austria  is  to  prevent  a  rival  power, 
such  as  she  would  be  if  free  and  united,  from  holding  a  rank 
on  the  shores  of  the  Mediterranean.  Secondly,  and  by  far  the 
greater  obstacle,  is  the  spirit  of  disunion  among  her  own  sons. 
So  long  have  they  been  accustomed  to  look  upon  cities  as  coun¬ 
tries,  that  each  citizen  considers  his  neighbor  of  another  city 
as  a  stranger — their  country  is  embraced  within  the  limits  of 
their  city  walls.  The  bitter  recollections  of  former  feuds  and 
rivalries  are  still  active.  Venice  hates  Milan — Leghorn,  Flor¬ 
ence — Pisa  both  ;  in  short,  the  nearer  are  towns,  the  more  cor- 


ITALIAN  SIGHTS  AND  PAPAL  PRINCIPLES. 


346 


dial  is  the  hatred  that  exists  between  them.  Patriotism  is 
purely  local.  During  1848,  the  Livornese  wished  to  plunder 
Florence,  and  would  have  preferred  turning  their  arms  against 
their  countrymen  rather  than  against  their  common  enemy. 
The  little,  poverty-struck  Lucca,  now  merged  into  Tuscany, 
mourns  its  court,  and  resents  as  an  injury  its  absorption  into  a 
greater  and  more  powerful  state.  The  feeling  between  the 
numerous  states  into  which  Italy  is  divided  is  far  more  cordial 
than  between  the  cities  of  each  state.  Genoa  is  restless  under 
the  sway  of  Piedmont,  and  exalts  in  her  imagination  the  de¬ 
parted  glories  of  the  Ligurian  Republic.  Venice  dreams  still 
of  her  old  doges,  and  the  power  and  commerce  that  have  for¬ 
ever  forsaken  her  wave-washed  palaces.  The  peasantry  of 
Lombardy  prefer  Austrian  rule  to  Italian,  and  fired  upon  the 
patriots  in  1848  who  marched  to  their  relief.  Those  of  Tus¬ 
cany  cling  likewise  to  their  bondage.  They  say,  We  would 
rather  have  one  “  padrone”  than  many.  The  Grand  Duke  has 
a  right  to  be. our  master,  because  his  family  have  always  ruled 
us  ;  so  we  had  rather  have  him  than  new  masters.  The  un¬ 
lettered  Italian  mind  has  no  conception  of  political  liberty.  It 
is  a  condition  it  never  dreamed  of.  Despotism  may  be  cre¬ 
ated  in  an  hour,  but  republicanism  is  of  slow  growth.  Those 
who  hope  to  regenerate  Italy  in  a  day  are  putting  faith  in 
dreams. 

Is  there,  then,  no  hope  of  Italy?  Many  shrewd  observers 
say  no.  I  differ  from  them.  True,  I  believe  that  the  vices 
of  Italy  are  as  great  as  I  have  represented  them  to  be.  But 
there  is  also,  in  her  varied  population,  as  much  innate  talent, 
genius,  and  natural  goodness  of  heart  as  exists  in  any  country. 
Even  more  ;  for  nowhere  else,  unless  among  the  Greek  races, 
do  we  find  greater  intellectual  vitality,  if  I  may  so  term  it,  and 
sensitiveness  to  the  purely  sensuous  enjoyments  of  nature. 
Romanism  has  indeed  wilted  all  that  it  has  touched,  but  the 


346 


ITALIAN  SIGHTS  AND  PAPAL  PRINCIPLES. 


germ  still  exists.  Remove  the  causes,  and  the  evils  will  dis¬ 
appear.  In  the  simple-hearted  inhabitants  that  people  her 
mountain  vaHeys  she  has  resources  of  mind  and  soul  that  need 
but  the  talisman  of  cultivation  to  flood  with  new  life  her  cities 
and  her  fields.  Her  towns  still  shelter  learning,  science,  and 
virtue.  Her  industry  is  indeed  crushed,  and  her  commerce  an¬ 
nihilated  ;  but  the  same  race  that  once  won  the  markets  of  the 
world  still  exist,  emulous  of  the  fame  of  their  fathers.  New 
Savonarolas,  Michael  Angelos,  and  Rienzis  will  arise.  The 
race  of  great  hearts  and  lofty  minds  is  not  extinct,  We  say 
that  nations  die  out.  Is  it  so  ?  A  name  may  die  out,  but  hu¬ 
manity  never.  It  is  a  common  saying  that  the  races  of  Eu¬ 
rope  are  in  their  decline,  as  if  races  of  human  beings,  by  a 
physical  law,  arose  to  a  certain  climax,  and  then  degenerated 
to  mere  brutes  again.  If  this  theory  were  true,  what  creates 
the  greatness  of  the  United  States,  for  Americans  are  but  trans¬ 
planted  Europeans  ?  In  America  the  citizen  creates  the  gov¬ 
ernment,  in  Europe  the  government  creates  the  subject.  This 
simple  fact  explains  the  gulf  between  them.  The  European 
thrives  just  in  proportion  as  his  government  permits.  The 
Italians  are  but  what  their  rulers  have  made  them.  Change 
their  rulers,  and  there  is  hope.  Unfetter  the  mind,  and  it  will 
develop  new  channels  of  thought  and  enterprise.  Mental  stag¬ 
nation  was  never  intended  by  Providence  as  the  condition  of 
beings  created  in  his  own  image.  I  will  not  theorize  as  to  the 
immediate  agencies  by  which  Italy  can  be  united  and  regen¬ 
erated,  for  that  concerns  more  particularly  her  own  sons  ;  but 
that  she  can  be,  and  through  her  own  instrumentality,  aided 
by  the  sympathy  and  experience  of  other  nations  who  have 
passed  through  their  agony  of  travail,  I  both  firmly  believe  and 
devoutly  hope. 


CHAPTER  XIL 


ROME  THAT  WAS  AND  IS. 

In  no  city  is  the  gulf  between  the  Past  and  Present  so 
wide  as  in  Rome.  With  this  name,  associations  swell  high 
and  strong  in  the  voyager,  as,  launched  upon  the  wilderness  of 
the  Campagna,  he  slowly  traverses  its  solitudes,  with  St.  Pe¬ 
ter’s  dome  as  a  colossal  beacon  in  the  mid-heavens,  to  direct 
his  eyes  toward  the  site,  not  of  the  Rome  of  to-day,  but  of  the 
spectre  of  the  past,  which,  despite  reason,  will  haunt  his  im¬ 
agination.  The  Campagna  is  a  befitting  frame,  not  to  his  men¬ 
tal  picture,  but  to  the  moral  reality  which  awaits  his  eyes  in 
the  city  of  the  popes  as  inheritors  of  the  city  of  the  Csesars. 
From  whichsoever  side  we  approach  Rome,  the  same  treeless, 
broken,  dark  soil,  naked  hills,  and  wasted  country  meet  the 
view.  Villages  there  are  none.  Broken  masses  of  ruins, 
shapeless  and  nameless,  rise  at  intervals  over  its  surface  like 
surge-worn  rocks  on  wintry  shores.  Deserted,  tottering  tow¬ 
ers,  once  the  abode  of  mediaeval  violence,  in  ghost-like  rigidity, 
cast  melancholy  shadows  over  the  plain.  Long  lines  of  spec¬ 
tral  fences  lose  themselves  in  the  horizon.  Far  above  them, 
majestic,  sad,  and  lonely,  here  in  solitary  arches,  there  linked 
in  stone  embrace,  continuous  lines  disappearing  in  perspective 
threads,  the  imperial  aqueducts  lift  their  graceful  forms. 
Broken  masses  of  light,  fringed  by  stone-cast  shadows,  stream 
through  the  tall  archways  like  rays  of  olden  thought,  or  as 
though  eternity  opened  its  eyes  upon  time.  Along  their  di¬ 
minishing  lines  the  sight  wanders  on  until  lost  in  space.  By 


348 


ITALIAN  SIGHTS  AND  PAPAL  PRINCIPLES. 


them  alone  the  view  escapes  from  their  bed  of  desolation  to 
the  distant,  island-like  hills,  smiling  with  life  and  crowned 
with  verdure,  where  towns  and  villas,  sparkling  with  opal 
tints  as  the  sun  flashes  upon  their  white  walls,  heighten  even 
more  by  contrast  the  sterility  of  the  Campagna. 

In  the  natural  wildness  of  prairie-land  there  are  a  sweetness 
and  freshness  in  the  breath  of  nature  that  rejoices  the  blood. 
Its  virtues  are  simple,  sincere,  and  soul-speaking.  Green 
space  beneath,  besprinkled  with  a  gem-like  wild  Flora,  a  ho¬ 
rizon  set  with  the  dense  vegetation  of  virgin  forests,  and  the 
pearly  expanse  of  the  clear  sky  above,  make  up  a  landscape 
smile  that  none  but  a  bad  heart  can  look  upon  with  a  cold 
eye.  Not  so  the  Roman  Campagna!  Here  Nature  has  lost 
her  purity.  The  landscape  is  withered  and  shrunken  by  age 
and  crime.  Every  trace  of  innocent  beauty  and  primitive  vigor 
has  been  uprooted.  Instead  of  rejoicing  the  inner  life  and 
tempting  the  natural  man  to  sport  upon  its  surface,  and  to  es¬ 
say  its  productive  energies  for  his  profit,  it  repels  by  a  coun¬ 
tenance  furrowed  with  selfish  thought,  and  an  anatomy  racked 
by  pain  and  exhausted  by  futile  effort.  The  curse  of  Cain  lies 
upon  its  unwholesome  bosom.  None  but  the  Roman  Bedouin, 
the  disease-stricken  husbandman,  or  the  skin-clad  shepherd 
cleave  to  it.  Poverty  binds  them  with  fetters,  unloosed  except 
by  the  angel  of  death,  to  their  heavy  tasks  and  scanty  harvests 
upon  its  poisoned  soil.  Such  evidences  of  life  as  it  yields  are 
but  witnesses  to  its  desolation.  Stunted  trees,  repulsive  shrubs, 
fever-breeding  streams,  pools  reeking  with  sulphurous  smells, 
rain-plowed  ravines,  bald  hills,  and  verdure-stripped  plains, 
over  which  fly  startled  game,  and  on  which  ruminate  melan¬ 
choly  sheep  and  fierce  cattle,  with  here  and  there  a  patri¬ 
archal  tree,  branch-torn  and  all  but  leafless,  emblematic  of 
man  struggling  against  misery — these  are  the  external  features 
of  the  Campagna.  Across  it  in  various  directions,  like  shrunk- 


ITALIAN  SIGHTS  AND  PAPAL  PRINCIPLES. 


349 


en  veins,  wind  the  dreary  roads  that  connect  Rome  with  the 
civilized  world,  imparting  to  her,  however,  hut  a  faint  current 
of  life.  It  is  all  she  has.  Were  that  stream  withdrawn,  Rome 
and  the  Campagna  would  soon  become  one  common  home  for 
the  fox  and  wild-fowl.  The  natural  atmosphere  of  both  is 
death,  moral  and  physical.  And  yet  at  times  there  pours  over 
the  Campagna  from  the  setting  sun  a  golden,  purple  light,  that 
vails  it  with  a  beauty  more  of  heaven  than  earth,  as  if  to  show 
that  hope  never  deserts  nature.  Even  the  Campagna  can  re¬ 
pent  and  be  saved.  Once  human  vitality  gave  it  animation 
and  joy  ;  nature  clad  it  in  gay  colors  and  verdant  robes ;  it 
was  populous,  civilized,  and  redeemed  by  industry.  The  sites 
of  cities  and  villas  proclaim  its  former  wealth.  Antiquity, 
therefore,  found  it  a  smiling  wilderness.  Modern  enterprise  in 
vain  tries  its  restoration.  The  luxurious  villa  soon  beeomes  a 
damp  and  repulsive  ruin.  Farms,  if  any,  exhibit  the  misery 
of  the  husbandman  and  not  the  richness  of  the  soil.  Despair, 
disease,  and  poverty  brood  over  the  scene.  The  Campagna  is 
now  a  fit  setting  for  modern  Rome ;  an  expanse  over  which 
the  eye  moodily  broods  as  it  recalls  the  past,  or  hurriedly 
glances  as  it  gladly  escapes  to  the  hilly  country  beyond — its 
use  a  game-ground  or  field  for  puerile  fox-hunts  by  English 
Nimrods  and  Roman  imitators,  whose  horses  quake  at  far  less¬ 
er  gulfs  than  that  into  which  their  ancestral  Curtius  so  heroic¬ 
ally  plunged.  But  repentance  to  the  Campagna  will  never  be 
born  of  a  Roman  hierarchy.  The  ecclesiastical  cancer  has 
eaten  too  deep  into  humanity  for  other  cure  than  amputation. 
The  same  scope  and  vigor  of  enterprise  that  once  peopled  the 
Campagna  can  alone  redeem  it.  But  “  physician  heal  thyself” 
can  never  be  hoped  of  priest-throttled  Rome.  As  is  the  Cam¬ 
pagna  to  the  natural  eye,  so  is  the  spiritual  welfare  of  every 
country  overshadowed  by  this  church  colossus.  Man  and  na¬ 
ture  are  redeemed  only  in  the  degree  they  escape  its  bondage. 


ITALIAN  SIGHTS  AND  PAPAL  PRINCIPLES. 


3.>0 


The  character  of  a  city  may  be  read  in  its  environs.  8*66 
how  the  exuberance  of  the  domestic  life  of  London  escapes 
into  suburban  homes,  rays  of  wealth,  taste,  and  joy  from  the 
great  sun  of  commercial  civilization  !  Paris,  too,  brilliant  and 
buoyant  with  life  to  its  uttermost  circulation  ;  Dresden,  a  dark 
gem  in  a  light  setting ;  Vienna,  a  grand  dame  in  full  toilet, 
surrounded  by  a  stately  progeny  of  her  own  bone  and  blood ; 
New  York,  a  focus  of  enterprise  and  riches,  giving  birth  year¬ 
ly  to  rival  cities  ;  Boston,  queen-like,  with  her  train  embroid¬ 
ered  with  towns  and  villages,  the  whole  scene  the  fairest  edi¬ 
tion  of  pictorial  Christianity,  wedded  to  knowledge  and  pros¬ 
perity,  the  world  has  yet  issued.  In  these  and  kindred  towns 
we  have  but  to  glance  at  the  exterior  to  detect  the  healthful 
beat  of  the  public  heart,  sending  life-giving  streams  in  every 
direction.  We  approach  these  great  central  organizations 
through  avenues  of  life.  Not  so  with  Home !  The  path  to 
her  lies  over  the  plain  of  death.  What  the  sluggish  and  mud¬ 
dy  lagoons  of  Venice,  when  drained  by  the  tide,  festering  in 
the  hot  sun,  and  traversed  only  by  snake-like  channels,  in  the 
beds  of  which  squirm  slimy  eels  amid  tangled  sea-weed,  are 
to  that  city,  the  Campagna  is  to  Rome.  But  the  ocean  daily 
bathes  Venice  with  its  waters,  and  proffers  its  tribute,  as  of 
old,  to  its  grateful  mistress.  An  artery  of  modernism,  the  rail¬ 
road,  saved  her  from  utter  desolation.  Rome  is  an  isolated 
wreck  amid  the  sea  of  the  Campagna,  clinging  convulsively  to 
the  rock  on  which  she  foundered. 

What  is  the  rock  on  which  she  has  twice  shipwrecked  her 
fortunes  ?  Absolute  power !  In  asserting  universal  dominion, 
she  has  lost  the  power  of  self-preservation.  As  in  her  impe¬ 
rial  dotage  she  became  the  spoil  and  contempt  of  barbarians, 
so  now,  in  her  ecclesiastical  decrepitude,  she  is  the  beggar  of 
Christendom,  whining  where  she  dare  not  threaten,  her  pride 
equaled  only  by  her  poverty.  ,  -  - 


ITALIAN  SIGHTS  AND  PAPAL  PRINCIPLES. 


351 


The  physical  aspect  of  modern  Rome,  especially  as  seen 
from  the  Pincian,  is  noble.  Its  sea  of  roofs  is  broken  by  an 
archipelago  of  domes,  on  the  right  of  which  rises  St.  Peter’s, 
the  leviathan  of  them  all,  giving  to  the  city  a  grand  atmo¬ 
spherical  outline,  in  keeping  with  the  stateliness  of  the  neigh¬ 
boring  hills.  Against  the  horizon  spectral  pines  stand  stiff 
and  solemn.  Toward  the  west,  where  the  Tiber  escapes  from 
broken  walls  and  ruined  arches,  the  Campagna,  in  great  swells 
of  earth,  rolls  onward  until  it  loses  itself  under  the  waves  of 
the  Mediterranean.  The  eye  instinctively  follows  the  path  of 
the  setting  sun  in  its  journey  through  space,  luxuriating  in  the 
golden  robe  of  many  colors  with  which  it  mantles  the  Eternal 
City,  as  if,  in  giving  it  a  glimpse  of  the  heavenly  Jerusalem,  it 
bade  it  repent  and  wear  that  garment  of  glory  forever. 

Modern  Rome  is  born  of  the  Church.  I  will  not  penetrate 
beyond  the  skin  to  show  its  constitution.  Such  life,  cleanli¬ 
ness,  and  comfort  as  it  possesses  have  been  forced  upon  it  by 
the  exigencies  of  pilgrims  to  its  shrines  of  arts  rather  than  to 
its  altars.  Real  Rome  is  dirty,  comfortless,  and  torpid ;  the 
home  of  beggars,  indolence,  and  superstition.  This  is  the  true 
city  of  the  Church  ;  the  city  of  the  travelers  is  another  work. 
Withdraw  them,  and  you  have  the  city  of  the  popes — a  carcass 
picked  by  ravens,  The  scavenger-birds  are  sleek  and  lively, 
but  they  thrive  upon  the  flesh  of  their  victims.  True,  there 
are  palaces,  museums,  and  churches  ;  hospitals  and  alms¬ 
houses  ;  colleges  and  libraries ;  treasures  of  knowledge  and 
miracles  of  art ;  mighty  souvenirs  of  intellect,  wealth,  pride, 
and  devotion.  The  spoils  of  Imperial  Rome  are  the  livelihood 
of  Papal  Rome.  But  the  Church  takes  no  real  delight  in  these 
things.  Her  heart  is  with  her  mouldy  bones  ;  her  holy  anat¬ 
omies  ;  fragments  of  saints  ;  ghastly  elbow-joints  and  sepul¬ 
chral  curls ;  Christ’s  cradles.  Virgin’s  petticoats,  rusty  iron 
from  martyrs’  crosses ;  drops  of  blood  that  defy  time  to  coag- 


352 


ITALIAN  SIGHTS  AND  PAPAL  PRINCIPLES. 


ulate  ;  Passover  tables  ;  holy  stairways  ;  columns  sanctified 
by  the  sufiering  of  the  Savior,  handkerchiefs  by  his  bloody 
sweat ;  the  toys  of  an  age  of  darkness  metamorphosed  into  the 
idols  of  an  age  of  light ;  hambinos^  holy  dolls,  tawdry  and  be- 
jeweled,  so  hideous  in  their  ugliness  that  an  infant  would 
start  from  them  in  affright,  yet  daily  slobbered  over  with  sin¬ 
ners’  kisses  to  win  the  papal  paradise,  and  made  richer  than 
any  CroBSUs  through  superstitious  hope  to  escape  hell  by  buy¬ 
ing  heaven ;  heathen  idols  transformed  into  modern  gods,  be¬ 
fore  whom  more  prayers  are  said  than  rise  to  Heaven  from  all 
the  closets  of  Christendom — such  are  the  real  treasures  of  mod¬ 
ern  Rome.  Her  soul  is  in  them.  She  prefers  the  millinery 
and  acting  of  her  ritual,  the  multiplication  of  her  holidays,  the 
robing  of  her  priests  and  the  tawdry  decoration  of  her  altars, 
the  propagation  of  a  new  dogma  and  the  discovery  of  a  new 
relic,  to  all  that  science,  art,  and  progress  are  doing  elsewhere 
for  humanity. 

In  1854,  this  century  of  so-called  intelligence,  the  Holy  Fa¬ 
ther,  “  with  the  aid  of  the  Holy  Ghost,”  as  he  claims,  has  add¬ 
ed  to  the  Roman  mythology  a  woman-god,  “  the  most  holy 
Virgin  Mary,  Mother  of  God,”  to  whom  the  faithful  are  to 
pray.  Despite  the  experience  of  Adam,  the  Roman  Church 
puts  its  trust  in  a  woman,  born  of  man.  Can  the  imbecility 
of  dogmatism  go  farther  !  The  woman,  of  whom  Christ  said 
at  his  first  miracle,  “  Woman,  what  have  I  to  do  with  thee  ?” 
I  object  not  to  softening  the  heart  of  man  by  elevating  Mary 
to  the  type  of  the  perfect  being  of  her  sex,  and  thus  making 
her,  by  association,  a  humanizing  element  of  religion  ;  but  the 
substitution  of  the  Virgin  as  a  direct  object  of  worship  in  place 
of  God,  as  is  the  increasing  practice  of  Romanism,  is  as  posi¬ 
tive  an  act  of  idolatry  as  any  for  which  Canaan  was  cursed. 
The  wheels  of  papal  Christendom  are  turning  backward.  She 
is  in  her  dotage,  and  must  give  way,  in  her  turn,  to  greater 


ITALIAN  SIGHTS  AND  PAPAL  PRINCIPLES. 


353 


liofht.  In  Rome  alone  can  we  see  the  full  workino:  of  her 
mind-destroying  system.  Elsewhere  she  is  checked  or  mod¬ 
ified  by  civil  institutions. 

I  have  before  me  a  circular,  issued  during  Lent  of  this  year 
(1855),  giving  a  list  of  English  sermons  to  be  preached  in 
Rome.  At  the  bottom  it  reads,  “  The  Holy  Father  has  gra¬ 
ciously  granted  Seven  Years’  Indulgence  to  he  gained  by  at¬ 
tending:  each  one  of  the  sermons,  and  a  Plenary  Indulgence 
by  attending  them  all,  with  the  usual  conditions  annexed  of 
confession,  holy  communion,  and  praying  for  His  intention, 
the  extirpation  of  all  heresies,  and  the  exaltation  of  Holy 
Church.”  “These  indulgences  are  applicable  to  the  souls  in 
Purgatory.” 

Such  gibberish  is  gravely  uttered  by  the  spiritual  head  of 
Christendom  nearly  two  thousand  years  after  the  “  Word  Avas 
made  flesh,”  that  it  might  be  intelligible  to  mankind.  What 
hope  has  truth  in  the  keeping  of  a  hierarchy  ? 

Were  the  absurdities  and  inanities  of  the  Roman  ritual  con¬ 
fined  to  Rome,  one  would  pity  and  forget.  But  living  in  Rome, 
and  seeing  it  as  the  great  heart  from  which,  through  the  pow¬ 
erful  arteries  of  superstition  and  faith,  the  great  paralyzing 
dogmas  of  papacy  go  forth  to  stagnate  the  blood  of  Christen¬ 
dom,  hanging  like  a  black  pall  over  intellectual  progress,  a 
gloom  shrouds  the  spirit  and  weighs  upon  the  understanding. 
Every  where  the  spectre  of  this  great  lie  lifts  its  head.  No 
feast  is  without  the  skeleton.  Hence  one  weighty  reason  of 
the  moral  depression  that  afflicts  so  many  visitors  at  Rome. 
They  feel  the  effects  without  tracing  the  cause.  Physical  na¬ 
ture  sympathizes,  as  we  see  in  the  Campagna,  with  the  lack 
of  the  vitality  of  truth,  without  which  neither  individual  nor 
nation  can  escape  the  curse  of  wasted  talents. 

The  architecture  of  modern  Rome,  as  a  whole,  is  in  keep¬ 
ing  with  its  theology — either  pompous,  coldly  rich,  and  incon- 


354 


ITALIAN  SIGHTS  AND  PAPAL  PRINCIPLES. 


gruously  magnificent,  as  in  St.  Peter’s  and  its  sister  churches, 
or  deformed,  inconsistent,  overloaded  with  inappropriate  or¬ 
nament,  made  up  of  stolen  classical  wealth  and  debased  mod¬ 
ern  ornamentation,  as  in  the  general  medley  of  styles  of  the 
later  churches.  Externally,  meagre  or  pretentious  ;  internally, 
having  widely  departed  from  primitive  simplicity  and  sincer¬ 
ity,  it  revels  in  tawdry  decorations  and  theatrically  contrived 
effects,  offensive  to  the  cultivated  eye,  though  dazzling,  per¬ 
haps,  to  the  rude  imagination.  Worship  in  Rome  has  been 
resolved  into  external  ceremonies,  from  which  their  ancient 
significance  has  long  since  fled.  The  senses,  and  not  the  heart, 
are  attracted  ;  the  passions,  and  not  the  intellect,  are  the  levers 
of  papal  power. 

In  domestic  architecture  there  are  but  two  types — the  re- 
naissant  palatial,  haughty  and  imposing,  and  the  common, 
poor,  mean,  and  repulsive,  yielding  long,  narrow,  grimed 
streets,  the  sham  of  civilization  without  the  substance.  These 
two  styles  stare  at  each  other  in  mutual  hate,  and  both,  with 
few  exceptions,  have  upon  them  a  common  deposit  of  ances¬ 
tral  dirt,  that  tells  of  general  poverty  and  untidiness 

The  Corso  is  an  anomaly  in  Rome.  It  is  a  noble  street — a 
connecting  link  between  Rome  and  modern  civilization.  There 
are  noble  avenues  stretching  over  its  seven  hills  in  all  direc¬ 
tions,  focusing  the  eye  upon  Egyptian  obelisks,  vast  basilicas, 
colossal  statuary,  and  generous  fountains.  The  series  of  ar¬ 
chitectural  coups  d’ceil  are  varied  and  wonderful.  But  the 
city  lacks  in  this  respect  individuality.  Its  external  character 
is  not  its  own.  As  in  antiquity  a  conquered  world  was  pil¬ 
fered  of  its  arts  and  wealth  to  adorn  Rome,  so  in  modern  times, 
Christendom  for  centuries  has  poured  its  tribute  into  her  lap, 
to  recreate  what  the  barbarians  devastated.  Imperial  Rome 
has  proved  an  exhaustless  granary  for  papal  Rome.  The  pres¬ 
ent  city  dates  but  little  more  than  three  centuries  back.  It  is 


ITALIAN  SIGHTS  AND  PAPAL  PRINCIPLES. 


355 


a  medley  of  wilderness  and  crowded  streets ;  of  buried  and 
disinterred  ruins  ;  of  mutilated  or  restored  classical  art,  mon¬ 
uments,  statues,  bridges,  temples,  columns,  severed  aqueducts, 
and  forums — the  wrecks  of  pagan  empire  transformed  into  tro¬ 
phies  of  Christian  rule.  That,  however,  most  proudly  shows 
itself  in  the  universal  cross  and  keys  of  St.  Peter,  and  in  the 
barbarous,  preposterous,  and  grotesque  variations  which,  born 
of  the  Michael  Angelique  style,  directed  by  monks,  have  made 
the  Church  architecture  of  the  modern  city  at  once  the  most 
pretending  and  the  most  abominable  of  the  civilized  world. 

Of  the  domestic  architecture  of  the  city  of  the  Csesars,  ex¬ 
cept  the  palaces  of  the  patricians,  we  have  no  relics.  Con¬ 
fused  piles  of  rubbish  overgrown  by  vineyards,  here  and  there 
a  broken  shaft  and  mutilated  capital  peering  through  the  soil, 
alone  mark  the  sites  of  the  homes  of  the  Roman  populace. 
Their  houses  were  high,  divided  into  floors  as  now,  and  in 
size,  distribution,  and  general  appearance — except,  perhaps, 
some  modern  advantage  in  way  of  glazed  windows,  though 
the  Romans  used  glass  for  this  purpose — no  doubt  they  looked 
then  much  the  same  as  the  common  houses  do  now.  Rude 
doorways,  rough  pavements,  narrow  and  dark  passages,  leg- 
wearying  stone  staircases,  windows  pervious  to  every  blast, 
shutters  sun-cracked  and  rickety,  humble  doors  with  the  locks 
of  a  Bastille,  accumulations  of  dirt  that  bespeak  long  familiar¬ 
ity,  festoons  of  washed  linen  hung  to  dry  from  front  windows 
— in  flne,  every  thing  which  in  manufacture  and  custom  can  be 
condensed  into  the  English  sentence  utter  shiftlessness,  are 
the  facts  of  a  Roman  household,  With  water  in  such  abund¬ 
ance  that,  with  the  eyes  shut,  the  play  of  fountains  seems  to 
the  senses  a  perpetual  rain,  yet  no  domestic  interiors  the  world 
over  have  probably  so  slight  an  acquaintance  with  that  puri¬ 
fying  element.  Delicious  water  it  is  too,  much  too  good  to  be 
wasted  on  a  dirt-loving  population. 


356 


ITALIAN  SIGHTS  AND  PAPAL  PRINCIPLES. 


Roman  habits  remain  as  unchanged  as  their  habitations. 
Modern  requirements  have,  to  some  extent,  forced  improve¬ 
ments  upon  Rome  ;  consequently,  we  have  gas,  paved  streets, 
good  drains,  and,  as  a  whole,  no  doubt  a  more  cleanly  and  con¬ 
venient  city  than  Augustus  could  boast.  Pleliogabalus,  on  one 
occasion,  on  a  bet,  collected  in  Rome  ten  thousand  pounds  of 
cobwebs.  He  failed,  however,  in  exterminating  spiders,  as 
their  works  still  show.  Vespasian  laid  a  tax  on  a  certain 
nameless  public  habit  of  the  citizens  in  the  streets,  which  ob¬ 
tains  as  freely  to  this  day,  though  less  in  Rome  than  in  Flor¬ 
ence,  to  the  disgust  of  cleanly  minds  every  where.  Hopeless 
of  reforming  their  beastly  customs,  the  Emperor  sought  to  make 
them  subservient  to  the  scavenger’s  work.  The  money  raised 
was  employed  in  cleaning  the  streets  of  rotting  carcasses,  and 
the  bodies  of  those  killed  by  lightning,  or  who  had  committed 
suicide  without  just  cause.  These  were  left  to  rot  in  the  pub¬ 
lic  ways.  Such  sanitary  facts  are  seldom  put  in  conjunction 
with  the  Golden  House  of  Nero.  Hence  the  imagination,  no 
doubt,  often  depresses  new  to  the  exaltation  of  old  Rome, 
whereas,  in  municipal  cleanliness,  the  former  has  the  ad¬ 
vantage. 

Between  Constantine  and  Julius  Second  there  is  a  wide  gap 
in  the  external  history  of  Rome.  The  Csesars  have  stamped 
their  features  indelibly  upon  the  Seven  Hills.  We  look  in  vain, 
however,  for  the  monuments  of  the  mediaeval  interval,  that 
age  of  violence,  dissension,  and  ruin.  A  few  Tuscan  towers, 
some  restored  mosaics  and  frescoes,  relics  of  primitive  churches 
incorporated  into  new,  scattered  bits  of  Lombard  sculptures 
and  shafts  to  be  traced  in  house  walls  in  the  Transtevere,  the 
so-called  house  of  Rienzi,  and  two  massive,  dismantled  brick 
towers  of  the  eleventh  century,  and  we  have  all  in  Rome  that 
carries  the  mind  into  this  deep  gulf  of  time.  Every  other  city 
in  Italy  is  alive  with  mediaeval  associations.  The  buildings, 


ITALIAN  SIGHTS  AND  PAPAL  PRINCIPLES. 


357 


arts,  and  customs  of  that  age  still  overshadow  the  present.  In 
Florence  especially  is  this  the  case.  The  homes  of  Dante, 
Michael  Angelo,  and  Galileo,  the  palaces  of  her  Medician  des¬ 
pots  and  her  republican  Gonfalonieri,  the  very  roofs  which 
sheltered  her  Guelph  and  Ghibelline  factions — in  short,  all  that 
gave  character  to  Florence  in  this  epoch,  still  remain  to  famil¬ 
iarize  the  present  with  the  past.  Every  street  has  its  tradi¬ 
tion.  In  Rome,  no !  Rienzi’s  name  is  the  sole  link  that  as¬ 
sociates  mediaeval  history  with  a  local  habitation.  Even  this 
is  apocryphal.  The  names  of  Colonna,  Orsini,  Savelli,  Mar- 
celli,  Maximi,  and  other  historical  reputations,  live  in  Rome  in 
modern  buildings  and  streets.  They  were  the  destroyers  of 
old  Rome,  leaving  nothing  behind  them  but  the  regret  that 
they  ever  existed.  Consequently,  at  the  present  day,  we  must 
see  in  Rome  either  the  remains  of  the  Imperial  city,  linking 
our  thoughts  to  associations  of  its  universal  empire,  or  the  ec¬ 
clesiastical  city,  compounded  of  religious  dogmas  and  classical 
relics,  arrogating  to  itself  the  spiritual  guidance  of  the  world. 

Cosmopolitan  in  its  claims,  it  is  cosmopolitan  in  its  making 
up.  Obelisks  of  Egypt ;  statues  of  Phidias ;  master-pieces  from 
Greece  ;  precious  works  from  all  climes  ;  the  noble  arched 
buildings  of  her  own  origin,  mingled  with  the  genius  of  Ra¬ 
phael,  Michael  Angelo,  and  Bramante  ;  the  tasteless  works  of 
Bernini ;  Canova’s  superior  art ;  artists  and  designs  from  be¬ 
yond  the  Alps  ;  contributions  from  universal  Christendom  fused 
together  in  the  papal  crucible,  distinct  and  widely  apart  in 
their  elements,  yet  forming  that  solemn,  strange,  fascinating 
whole  we  call  Rome. 

The  “  Niobe  of  nations”  has  played  the  chief  part  in  the 
history  of  civilization.  Twice  has  she  filled  the  role  of  prog¬ 
ress.  Her  ambition  of  universal  political  dominion  brought 
mankind  into  legally-constructed  and  governmental  communi¬ 
ties,  of  which  she  was  the  heart.  Men  learned  to  be  governed 


358 


ITALIAN  SIGHTS  AND  PAPAL  PRINCIPLES. 


by  law  after  being  subdued  by  the  sword.  Civilization  and 
order  followed  her  banners.  Unlike  modern  Rome,  she  did 
not  proselyte.  Religions  she  left  free,  or  received  them  into 
her  own  prolific  mythology.  Thus  she  gave  more  than  she 
took.  The  ancient  world  was  never  more  peaceful  and  pros¬ 
perous  than  when  reposing  beneath  the  shadow  of  Rome. 
Her  government  and  material  civilization  being  superior  to 
others  of  that  age,  they  succumbed  ;  but  she  depended  too 
much  upon  her  material  power,  which  was  corrupt  in  princi¬ 
ple,  sensual,  and  selfish.  The  imagination  recalls  only  the  in¬ 
domitable  virtue  of  the  republic,  and  the  grandeur  and  civil¬ 
izing  principles  of  the  imperial  sway.  In  Rome,  therefore, 
the  mind,  by  the  contrasting  feebleness  of  the  present  govern¬ 
ment,  its  ragged  magnificence,  and  futile  claims  to  dominion, 
is  irresistibly  thrown  back  to  the  great  past,  which  looms  up  so 
vast  in  the  horizon  of  history.  Mighty  events,  rather  than 
great  souls,  haunt  the  memory  with  their  spectral  shadows. 
The  Past  lives  while  the  Present  swoons.  Even  the  crimes 
and  spectacles  of  the  old  city,  from  their  very  scale,  become 
attractive  in  contrast  with  the  dwarfish  efforts  of  the  modern. 
It  is  difficult  to  sleep  quietly  where  every  stone  has  a  tongue, 
and  the  very  air  is  peopled  with  the  shapes  of  olden  life,  sin¬ 
cere  and  strong,  in  its  contrasting  lights  of  vice  and  virtue. 
There  is  too  much  vitality  of  association  for  sensitive  nerves. 
This,  joined  to  an  atmospherical  torpor,  arising  from  poisonous 
exhalations,  as  well  as  the  constant  mental  conflict  between 
reality  and  vision,  the  actual  feebleness  of  papal  rule  in  con¬ 
trast  with  its  claims  to  infallibility,  its  acts  warring  with  its 
principles,  produce  an  intellectual  excitement  in  many  minds 
unfavorable  to  health.  Extremes  meet  in  Rome.  To  some  it 
is  a  renewal  of  the  lease  of  life  ;  while  to  others,  every  breath 
they  inhale  savors  of  death.  Two  classes  alone  of  strangers 
can  enjoy  Rome,  Artists  who  live  only  in  their  ideal  world, 


ITALIAN  SIGHTS  AND  PAPAL  PRINCIPLES. 


359 


or  visitors  who  turn  Rome  into  a  watering-place.  Frivolity  is 
a  weed  that  thrives  on  every  soil.  One  other  race  finds  here 
its  natural  atmosphere.  In  fact,  it  creates  it.  Priests  have 
made  modern  Rome.  It  is  a  labyrinth  of  churches,  convents, 
monasteries,  and  colleges,  the  clew  to  which  is  a  feeble  old 
man,  embalmed  in  ceremonies  and  swaddled  in  sacred  robes. 
Poor  old  Adamite !  the  prisoner  of  Christendom — a  mistaken 
sacrifice  to  that  “  love  which  casteth  out  all  fear !” ' 

Rome  filled  her  second  r61e  of  progress  when,  in  early  Chris¬ 
tianity  and  the  Middle  Ages,  society  being  ingulfed  in  the  ma¬ 
terial  wreck  of  the  imperial  sway,  a  strong  arm  was  needed  to 
enforce  strong  principles,  and  unite  mankind  under  one  faith. 
The  Church  fulfilled  this  mission.  She  spread  Christianity 
over  Europe.  ,By  her  system,  it  was  done  perhaps  speedier 
and  more  thoroughly  than  it  could  have  been  done  by  any  oth¬ 
er.  Papacy,  therefore,  has  performed  its  mission.  Selfish  as 
all  human  power  has  shown  itself,  it  now  says,  “  Perish  prog¬ 
ress,  spread  idolatry,  retrograde  the  world,  but  let  me  live  the 
Absolute !” 

Papacy  is  still  strong,  because  it  allies  itself  to  the  selfish 
passions  and  fears  of  mankind.  Until  the  spirit  is  released 
from  external  bondage,  Rome  will  continue  to  be  the  night¬ 
mare  on  Progress.  . 


CHAPTER  XIII. 


A  DREAM  OF  VENICE. 

Steam  bore  us  whizzing  along  from  Padua  toward  Venice. 
It  was  near  dusk.  Without  the  cars,  the  rain  poured  in  tor¬ 
rents.  Within,  cigar  smoke  poisoned  still  more  the  scanty 
air,  and  stifled  our  breaths.  Preferring  a  wetting  to  suflbca- 
tion,  P  opened  a  window  and  thrust  my  head  into  the  damp 
atmosphere.  At  the  north  lay  the  horizon  boundary  of  the 
Alps,  looming  up  vast  and  mysterious  in  the  distance,  entirely 
shrouded  at  times  in  purple  mist ;  then,  as  the  rain  gradually 
ceased,  rolling  off  its  vaporous  garments,  and  presenting  its 
craggy  summits  in  all  their  solemn  grandeur  against  the  de¬ 
parting  twilight.  On  either  side  lay  canals  and  morasses, 
water-filled  and  water-soaked  to  the  brim.  It  was  difficult  to 
reconcile  the  firm,  elastic  gliding  of  the  cars  with  their  appa¬ 
rently  watery  support.  As  we  emerged  from  the  last  bound¬ 
ary  which  marked  the  termination  of  this  amphibious  soil, 
and  shot  out,  as  it  were,  upon  the  clear  lagoon,  with  its  re¬ 
freshing  salt  breeze,  the  dash  of  ocean  water  before,  behind, 
and  all  around,  while  the  narrow  causeway  over  which  we 
slid  was  almost  hidden  from  sight,  it  became  even  more  diffi¬ 
cult  to  feel  that  we  owed  our  progress  to  iron  and  stone. 
Over  our  heads  lay  suspended  a  canopy  of  vapor.  About  our 
faces  blew  the  night  wind.  The  sea  moaned  listlessly  at  our 
feet.  Just  discernible  in  the  rear  lay  the  long,  low,  sad  coast¬ 
line.  In  front,  toward  which  we  were  reaching  with  steam- 
speed,  as  if  we  had  suddenly  been  launched  from  substance 


ITALIAN  SIGHTS  AND  PAPAL.  PRINCIPLES. 


361 


into  space,  rose  dim  tall  forms,  irregular  opaque  masses,  inter¬ 
spersed  with  bright  lights.  As  W'e  drew  near,  they  took  hab¬ 
itable  shape — high  towers,  massive  domes,  huge  walls  sleep¬ 
ing  upon  the  water !  There  was  an  unreal  sense  in  all  this 
that  to  the  stranger  gave  the  whole  the  idea  of  a  phantom 
ride  and  a  phantom  city.  Nevertheless,  it  was  Venice,  in 
fame  and  solidity  unsurpassed  by  any  sister  town. 

Each  city  in  which  Time  has  harvested  rich  associations 
has  a  character  as  defined  as  that  of  the  distinguished  indi¬ 
vidual.  Thought  in  relation  to  it  becomes  one.  We  speed  to 
its  welcome  as  to  that  of  an  acquaintance,  investing  its  mate¬ 
rial  substance  with  ideas  of  mingled  good  and  evil,  lofty  aspi¬ 
ration  and  base  action — in  short,  the  mingled  virtues  and  vices 
of  its  peculiar  humanity.  It  becomes  to  us  a  great  whole — the 
Man  city,  that  we  wish  to  know  in  person,  its  past  and  pres- 
ent  united  and  individualized.  ^ 

The  three  cities  which  most  powerfully  appeal  to  the  hu¬ 
man  heart  in  this  respect  are  Jerusalem,  Eome,  and  Venice, 
each  the  centre  of  ideas  that  have  powerfully  affected  the  hu¬ 
man  race.  Jerusalem  lifts  us  toward  heaven.  In  Rome  we 
see  the  civilizer  and  tyrant,  the  sepulchre  of  religion  and  free¬ 
dom,  a  nightmare  among  nations.  Venice,  the  fallen  queen 
of  commerce,  that  for  a  thousand  years  held  the  throne  of  the 
seas.  No  other  human  marts  can  rival  these  in  soul-emotions, 
and  stir  within  us  more  powerfully  associative  sympathies. 
Pity  it  is  that  on  approaching  each,  jarring  notes  are  ever 
struck  upon  the  chord  of  our  mental  illusion,  breaking  the 
magic  harmony  of  the  past  by  the  vulgar  necessities  of  the 
present. 

Externally,  at  a  distance  and  nigh  to,  no  city  more  bravely 
wears  its  crown  of  romance  than  V enice.  Internally,  nowhere 
is  the  illusion  of  sovereignty  more  thoroughly  dispelled.  Yet 
Venice,  both  from  her  site  upon  the  waters  and  the  associa- 

a 


362 


ITALIAN  SIGHTS  AND  PAPAL  PRINCIPLES. 


tions  of  her  name,  still  remains  Venice,  and  will  continue  to 
instruct  and  interest  long  after  the  last  marble  of  her  palaces 
shall  have  sunk  beneath  their  ocean  beds. 

The  rudest  shock  to  the  imagination  is  received  upon  the 
threshold  of  the  city,  at  the  station,  an  unromantic  shed  of  a 
building,  into  the  farther  offices  of  which  the  stranger  is  un¬ 
ceremoniously  thrust,  to  be  inspected  by  the  police,  and  con¬ 
fronted  with  all  the  annoyances  of  the  modern  passport  sys¬ 
tem,  if  possible  made  more  diabolical  from  being  Austrianized. 
Having  safely  weathered  this  Scylla,  his  nose,  eyes,  and  com¬ 
plexion  being  decided  to  be  his  own  and  no  one’s  else,  his 
mission  to  Venice  a  legitimate  one,  the  usual  coins  slid  into 
itching  palms  to  prevent  a  worn  coat  being  converted  into  mer¬ 
chandise  contraband  to  a  “free  port,”  he  is  told  to  “  step  out,” 
whereupon  he  finds  himself  upon  Charybdis,  in  the  shape  of 
a  pigmy  stone  quay,  surrounded  by  a  rapacious  crowd  scream¬ 
ing,  “Take  an  omnibus,  sir?”  Seizing  upon  him  and  his 
baggage,  he  is  bodily  injected  into  a  prosaic-looking  boat,  half 
house,  half  skifi',  which,  to  his  amazement,  he  finds  dubbed 
“  omnibus.”  Shades  of  the  Doges,  forgive  them  !  an  omnibus 
in  Venice  !  So  it  is,  but  it  goes  by  paddles  and  human  mus¬ 
cles,  and,  upon  the  whole,  is  not  a  bad  contrivance  for  locomo¬ 
tion  in  dirty  canals. 

The  night  was  dark,  the  rain  had  recommenced,  the  wind 
was  high,  the  waves  as  strong  as  scanty  sea-room  would  permit, 
when,  confounded  by  the  confusion  of  the  mingled  police  and 
custom-house  examinations  within,  and  blinded  by  the  mist 
and  lights  without,  I  found  myself,  with  several  ladies,  shut 
up,  at  ten  o’clock  at  night,  in  an  “  omnibus”  on  the  Grand  Ca¬ 
nal.  There  was  neither  room  to  sit  upright  nor  to  stretch 
out.  We  were  cramped  into  a  sugar-box  closed  tight,  and  set 
afloat  on  troubled  waters.  The  omnibus  rocked  and  bobbed 
about,  now  scraping  against  a  pier,  now  bumping  against  a 


ITALIAN  SIGHTS  AND  PAPAL  PRINCIPLES. 


363 


brother  omnibus,  the  men  shouting,  the  women-folks  scream¬ 
ing  “We  shall  be  drowned!”  and  thus,  amid  darkness,  noise, 
and  discomfort,  after  a  half-hour’s  novel  navigation,  we  found 
ourselves  suddenly  arrested  at  the  steps  of  a  grand  mansion. 
A  large  door  was  thrown  open,  the  prow  of  the  “  omnibus” 
was  run  over  the  threshold,  the  waves  dashed  in  upon  the 
marble  pavement,  we  sprang  out,  and  found  ourselves  on  the 
water-floor  of  a  “  grand  hotel.”  Up,  up  we  mounted,  a  hundred 
stone  steps  or  more,  over  polished  marble  staircases,  until  we 
W'ere  installed  in  the  centre  of  the  hotel  life,  under  the  eaves. 
A  room  looking  over  the  Grand  Canal,  toward  the  Lido,  was 
assigned  to  me.  Huge,  rickety  wooden  shutters  protected  the 
interior  from  the  outer  air.  1  managed  to  throw  one  Open. 
Far  beneath,  the  distance  magnified  by  the  darkness,  I  could 
hear  the  waves  swashing  against  the  foundations  of  the  pal¬ 
ace.  Opposite  and  on  either  side,  each  building  echoed  to 
similar  sounds.  An  occasional  light  glanced  over  the  fretful 
waters,  brightening  their  tiny  crests.  Above  and  about  me, 
the  winds  howled  dismally  through  Gothic  corridors  and  arched 
window'-ways,  every  rusty  hinge  creaking  a  harsh  accompani¬ 
ment,  A  confused  scene  of  rocking  masts  and  tangled  rigging, 
sighing  in  the  gale,  lay  before  me.  The  wind  came  in  salt 
and  angry  from  the  ocean.  Clouds  swept  by  heavily  and 
hastily.  The  ladies  had  complained  of  feeling  sea-sick  in  the 
“  omnibus.”  I  felt  qualmish  in  the  upper  story  of  the  massive 
hotel,  which  seemed  to  sway  with  all  the  moving  things  about 
it.  There  w’as  a  ship-feeling  of  unsteadiness  to  every  thing, 
or  something  worse,  for  it  seemed  as  if  we  were  far  out  to 
sea,  floating  by  uncertain  magic,  stone  on  water,  destined  by 
the  sudden  return  of  Nature  to  her  usual  laws  to  be  instanta¬ 
neously  ingulfed.  With  such  fancies  I  passed  my  first  and 
restless  night  at  Venice,  in  doubtful  and  unrefreshing  slumbers. 

The  morning,  however,  dawned  brightly.  Venice,  with  its 


364 


ITALIAN  SIGHTS  AND  PAPAL  PRINCIPLES. 


streets  of  water,  busy  with  gondolas  in  the  early  sunlight,  car¬ 
ried  out  the  illusion  of  the  previous  night  of  a  floating  city, 
but  now  nestling  like  a  sea-bird  quietly  on  the  ocean.  There 
is  an  indescribable  charm  in  the  novelty,  as  it  were,  of  living 
on  the  bosom  of  so  restless  an  element  without  seeing  land,  as 
is  the  case  in  some  positions,  yet  surrounded  by  all  the  secu¬ 
rity  and  comforts  of  the  firm  shore.  The  buildings,  rising  di¬ 
rectly  from  the  water,  seem  to  have  no  other  foundation  than 
its  treacherous  surface  ;  hence  the  contrast  between  the  solid¬ 
ity  of  the  one  resting  upon  the  liquidity  of  the  other,  without 
the  intermediate  agency  of  earth,  to  the  novice  causes  a  sensa¬ 
tion  of  dreamy  uncertainty,  as  if  the  whole  scene  was  vision¬ 
ary  rather  than  real.  The  common  experiences  of  travelers 
are  all  reversed.  Consequently  Venice,  irrespective  of  its  his¬ 
tory,  merely  from  the  peculiarity  of  its  site  and  the  general 
varying  of  the  perpendicular  in  its  architectural  lines,  must 
always  retain  a  charm  peculiarly  its  own. 

This  is  increased  by  the  absence  of  two  of  the  common 
nuisances  of  the  shore.  Here  we  have  neither  dust  nor  noise. 
There  is  no  difficulty  in  threading  one's  way  on  foot  all  over 
Venice  by  means  of  its  labyrinthine  lanes,  broken  continually 
by  pigmy  squares  or  piazzas,  in  the  centre  of  which  is  usually 
located  a  small  reservoir,  surmounted  by  elaborately-carved 
well-tops  in  stone.  These  constantly  remind  one  of  the  first 
great  necessity  of  a  city  built  on  the  brine,  viz.,  fresh  water. 
IVo  animals  intrude  upon  the  streets  of  Venice.  A  citizen 
may  pass  his  lifetime  among  them,  and  never  see  horse  or  ox. 
To  him  the  commonest  cattle  of  the  farm-yard  are  as  much  a 
curiosity  as  the  elephant  or  leopard.  He  may,  indeed,  have 
some  conception  of  a  lion  from  that  of  St,  Mark’s,  which,  in 
paint  and  stone,  stares  at  him  every  where  from  triumphal 
columns  and  public  walls.  But  the  glorious  standard  of  his 
republic  is  now  a  mocking  emblem,  and  he  turns  from  it  with 


ITALIAN  SIGHTS  AND  PAPAL  PRINCIPLES. 


365 


a  tear  in  his  eye  and  a  curse  on  his  lips.  Should  he  conceive 
of  the  real  lion,  he  would  doubtless  imagine  it  with  wings 
like  his  own. 

To  me  there  is  an  unfailing  source  of  pleasure  in  rambling 
through  the  intricate  streets  of  Venice.  A  city  in  which  one 
meets  only  the  noiseless  foot-passenger  is  something  of  itself. 
No  impudent  hackmen  or  obstinate  donkeys,  as  in  other  Ital¬ 
ian  cities,  disturb  the  serenity  of  one’s  contemplations.  In 
but  few  of  the  chief  arteries  is  there  ever  any  human  press. 
The  pavements  are  scrupulously  clean.  Beggars  are  obsolete 
under  Austrian  rule.  No  dust  clouds  the  vision.  Hoofs  there 
are  none  to  clatter  over  the  smooth  stones.  Opposite  houses 
almost  meet  at  their  eaves.  There  is  an  endless  variety  of 
turns — sharp  corners,  suggestive  of  passages  ending  in  blank, 
impenetrable  walls  ;  occasional  bits  of  earth,  scanty  verdure, 
or  a  few  meagre  flowers,  exiles  from  the  main  land,  water- 
sustained  and  imprisoned  in  cold  stone  borders  ;  shops  no 
larger  than  American  entries,  with  their  contents  most  tempt¬ 
ingly  thrust  into  the  narrow  streets  ;  every  few  steps,  ^rched 
bridges,  from  the  parapets  of  which  you  watch  the  silent,  mel¬ 
ancholy  gondola  as  it  shoots  underneath,  its  black  blinds  and 
funereal  curtains  shutting  out  all  view  of  its  occupants.  In 
short,  Venice  is  a  creation  by  itself.  Shut  up  amid  its  walls 
and  canals,  one  momentarily  forgets  the  glad  earth,  reveling 
in  new  emotions  until  their  wearisome  repletion  recalls  the 
familiar  associations  of  nature’s  open  skies  and  verdant  fields. 

A  gondola  and  Venice  are  almost  synonymous  terms.  Each 
pictures  the  other.  Neither  admits  of  other  associations.  If 
ever  divided,  both  will  lose  their  individuality,  which,  like 
happy  matrimony,  is  complete  only  by  union.  The  first  object 
tlie  stranger  calls  for  is  a  gondola  to  conjure  up  his  dream  of 
Venice.  Fortunately,  they  are  innumerable  and  cheap — less 
than  seventy-five  cents  per  day  for  the  best.  For  this  sum,  one 


306 


ITALIAN  SIGHTS  AND  PAPAL  PRINCIPLES. 


of  these  magic  vehicles  will  attend  you  as  closely  as  a  shadow 
from  sunrise  to  midnight.  Delicious  is  it  to  lounge  on  their 
luxurious  cushions,  shrouding  one’s  self  wholly  from  the  world, 
and,  gliding  over  still  waters  with  all  the  repose  of  a  pleasing 
dream,  revel  in  sensuous  ease.  If  your  companion  he  one  of 
the  dark-eyed,  warm-hearted  beauties  of  the  sea-girt  city  or 
Italy’s  burning  soil,  then  the  terrestrial  enchantment  is  com¬ 
plete.  Draw  the  curtains  and  throw  open  the  blinds.  It  is 
toward  sunset  in  June.  The  Grand  Canal  swarms  with  gon¬ 
dolas  filled  with  fair  women,  gallant  men,  and  joyous  chil¬ 
dren.  They  pass  and  repass  with  the  silence  and  rapidity  of 
swallows,  the  gondoliers,  now  straining  every  muscle  in  effort 
to  outspeed  their  rivals,  then  quietly  -and  gracefully  bending 
their  flexible  forms  to  the  propelling  oar,  sending  their  gondo¬ 
las  as  slowly  and  easily  over  the  water’s  surface  as  clouds 
float  through  a  serene  sky.  Friendly  nods,  waving  handker¬ 
chiefs,  and  meaning  glances  are  exchanged,  but  there  is  no 
levity  even  now  in  Venice.  Seldom  do  its  real  sons  and 
daughters  appear  in  public.  They  are  a  sad  and  impoverish¬ 
ed  remnant  of  a  race  that  won  the  rule  of  the  waves.  When 
seen,  they  still  maintain  the  serious  yet  benign  dignity  which 
characterized  their  ancestors,  sighing  over  the  Past,  and  effort¬ 
less  to  know  the  Present. 

The  graceful  form  of  the  gondola  is  rarely  given  by  the  art¬ 
ist.  It  floats  swan-like  on  the  water ;  in  appearance,  though 
not  in  reality,  is  as  easily  moved  as  if  it  had  instincts  and 
j)owers  of  its  own.  Fair  weather  is  its  true  element,  for  it 
has  no  storm  qualities.  A  worse  sea-boat  was  never  con¬ 
trived.  Flat,  long,  low,  and  rising  sharply  from  the  water  at 
either  end  in  serpent-like  crests ;  luxuriously  carpeted,  cush¬ 
ioned,  and  richly  carved  ;  at  once  aflbrding  the  most  complete 
privacy,  or,  with  its  top  off,  entire  freedom  of  vision,  it  combines 
in.  still  water  more  advantages  than  any  other  mode  of  con- 


ITALIAN  SIGHTS  AND  PAPAL  PRINCIPLES. 


367 


veyance.  Unlike  the  row-boat,  there' is  no  jerking  motion  of 
oars.  Whether  quick  or  slow,  it  invites  repose  and  suggests 
dreamy  fancies,  for  which  Venice  afihrds  ample  food.  Con¬ 
sequently,  for  the  invalid  or  idler  its  effect  is  paradisiacal.  The 
gondolier  being  at  the  back,  he  is  not  seen.  We  glide,  how¬ 
ever,  with  trout-like  quiet  and  ease  over  the  water,  without 
even  the  suggestion  of  labor  to  mar  the  soothing  effect. 

Formerly  the  gondolas  were  ornamented  with  various  col¬ 
ors,  rich  gilding,  and  every  decoration  which  could  add  to  their 
brilliancy  and  sumptuousness.  Then  the  canals  must  have 
glistened  with  opalescent  tints,  and  the  general  effect  been  ex¬ 
ceedingly  rich,  especially  as  the  national  costumes,  and  even 
the  architecture,  all  showed  the  same  fondness  for  deep  and 
rich  coloring.  Now  the  gondolas  are  all  clothed  in  sombre 
black.  Were  it  not  for  their  graceful  forms  and  light  motions, 
they  would  be  taken  for  water-hearses.  As  it  is,  their  mourn¬ 
ful  livery  suggests  mysterious  fancies  connected  with  the  fate 
of  the  republic,  but  the  true  reason,  I  believe,  for  their  uniform 
color  arises  from  an  old  sumptuary  decree  of  the  state,  which, 
to  check  the  extravagant  expense  lavished  upon  gondolas,  or¬ 
dained  the  present  equality  in  hue.  General  poverty  and  de¬ 
pression  continue  to  enforce  the  obsolete  law,  so  that  we  shall 
probably  never  see  a  change  in  this  respect,  because,  although 
Venetians  must  continue  to  go,  for  ages  to  come  as  for  a  thou¬ 
sand  years  back,  to  church  and  theatre,  to  their  baptisms  and 
their  burials,  to  their  marriages  and  their  lawsuits,  to  Opera 
and  office — in  short,  every  where  business,  pleasure,  or  neces¬ 
sity  call  them,  in  gondolas,  yet  the  soul  of  Venice  has  left  its 
body.  There  is  nothing  Venetian  at  heart.  The  real  Venice 
is  dead  —  dead  and  buried  in  the  irrevocable  Past.  That 
which  we  now  see  is  only  the  cast-off  garment,  here  and  there 
betraying  its  original  fashion,  but  disfigured  with  many  a  sad 
rent  and  uncongenial  repair.  Modernism  has  set  its  practical 


368 


ITALIAN  SIGHTS  AND  PAPAL  PRINCIPLES. 


seal  upon  all  that  constituted  its  pride  and  glory.  Picturesque 
costumes  have  vanished  before  the  Christian  hat  and  trow- 
sers.  Old  Jewdom,  in  its  modern  phase  of  homely,  unpictur- 
esque  apparel,  reigns  triumphant  over  the  quays  of  Yenice. 
A  few  Greeks  and  Turks,  men  from  Africa  or  the  Ionian  Isles, 
as  yet  refuse  to  bow,  down  before  modern  unity  in  dress.  Some 
fishermen  retain,  with  their  manly  forms  and  finely-bronzed 
complexions,  their  red  caps  and  colored  sails, ^with  quaint  de¬ 
vices.  But  in  general,  the  universal  black  hat  and  coat  of 
Christendom  are  fast  triumphing  over  color  and  variety  even 
here,  in  their  firm-set  seat  and  richest  expression,  while  the 
wheels  of  steam  froth  its  waters  and  send  panic  to  the  frail 
gondolas. 

All  is  not  lost,  however.  The  architecture  retains  a  por¬ 
tion  of  its  adamantine  hues,  which  time  and  the  restorer  still 
respect.  Jasper,  porphyry,  serpentine,  those  precious  stones 
which  Venetians,  in  their  love  for  their  city  and  feeling  for  the 
beautiful,  so  lavishly  wrought  into  their  palaces  and  churches 
in  harmonious  combinations  and  deep  meaning,  still  faintly 
throw  their  shadows  over  the  waters,  which  lovingly  give  back 
their  hues.  Changed  though  the  outer  form  may  be,  and  weak¬ 
ened  the  force  of  man’s  works,  yet  the  same  warm  sun,  as  it 
sinks  behind  the  far-off  hills,  bathes  dome  and  tower  in  trem¬ 
bling  purple  mist,  lighting  up  with  golden  brightness  sea  and 
sky,  while  soft,  vapory,  variegated  clouds,  warm  and  tender, 
brilliant  with  nature’s  loveliest  hues,  arch  the  heavens  in  al¬ 
most  imperceptible  gradation  from  their  sinking  source  of  beau¬ 
ty  in  the  west.  Toward  this  the  eye  wanders  in  an  aerial  per¬ 
spective,  deeper  and  deeper  into  space,  and  finding  no  end  save 
as  night  slowly  shrouds  the  glories  that  follow  the  sun  in  its 
course  to  gladden  other  hearts.  Nearer  by,  and  lower  down, 
the  long  reaches  of  the  great  canals  let  the  eye  into  shorter 
perspectives ;  shadowed  water  and  palace  reflecting ;  soft 


369 


ITALIAN  SIGHTS  AND  PAPAL  PRINCIPLES. 

I 

streams  of  hazy,  twinkling  brightness  ;  deep,  luminous  shad¬ 
ows,  a  mingled  horizon  of  sea  and  city  blending  into  each  oth¬ 
er,  and  wrapped  in  one  tender  robe  of  twilight,  harmonizing 
with  the  hues  of  heaven’s  painting.  Toward  the  Adriatic,  the 
long,  low  line  of  the  Lido  lies  like  a  thread  upon  the  water. 
Beyond,  the  setting  sun  glances  upon  white  sails,  that,  ghost¬ 
like,  seem  to  have  no  bodies,  for  the  hulls  of  the  vessels  are  cov¬ 
ered  by  the  intervening  land.  Between  the  Lido  and  Venice 
rise  numerous  sunlit  islands,  their  white  walls  sparkling  in 
golden  light,  heightened  by  an  occasional  bit  of  deep  green, 
from  the  few  trees  that  grow  thereupon.  But  what  words  can 
reflect  that  beautiful  sheet  of  water  between  the  Guideca  and 
the  Ducal  Palace,  on  which  is  mirrored  all  this  loveliness  ? 
The  summer’s  eve  brings  with  it  a  goodly  company  of  worship¬ 
ers,  who  repose  in  sensuous  delight  on  its  surface,  spell-bound 
by  the  enchantment.  From  many  gondolas,  music  steals  lov¬ 
ingly  over  the  waters,  caressing  and  caressed  by  the  zephyr 
that  bears  it  harmoniously  on  its  wings.  The  general  silence 
best  proclaims  the  soothing  romance  of  the  scene.  Occasional¬ 
ly  a  chorus  of  youthful  voices  breaks  forcibly  upon  the  ear  in 
some  well-known  Venetian  strain,  now  rising  loudly  on  the  still 
air,  then  dying  away  amid  the  intricacies  of  distant  canals.  The 
lights  from  the  Piazza  San  Marco,  as  night  shuts  in  the  scene, 
come  out  brightly  and  joyfully  in  the  distance.  Powdering  far 
above  all  other  objects,  dark,  stern,  and  majestic,  is  the  tower 
of  St.  Mark’s,  the  noblest  beacon-pile  reared  by  modern  man. 
Below  it  rise  the  clustered  domes  and  forest  of  shafts  of  the 
Cathedral ;  a  Christian  thought  in  Oriental  form  and  color ; 
pregnant  with  the  spoils  of  paganism,  written  all  over  with  the 
story  of  the  new  revelation — the  world’s  creation  and  man’s 
redemption  ;  eternal  and  legible  as  enduring  precious  material 
can  make  them  ;  the  faith  of  Venice  pictured  for  all  time,  and 
gathered  into  one  fantastic  and  yet  glorious  edifice,  emblem- 

a  2 


ITALIAN  SIGHTS  AND  PAPAL  PRINCIPLES. 


tro 


atic  in  the  richness  and  variety  of  its  decorations  of  all  the 
races  of  men,  their  artistic  triumphs  and  their  garnered  knowl¬ 
edge,  who  are  yet  to  come  up  to  the  new  Jerusalem,  and  sit  in 
peace  within  its  sanctuary.  Who  can  tread  the  wave-like 
mosaic  floor  of  this  venerable  church,  as  it  rises  and  falls  like 
the  swell  of  the  sea,  and  not  feel  that  its  foundations  are  in¬ 
deed  laid  upon  the  sands  of  the  deep  ? 

“  Jacomo,  land  me  at  the  Piazzetta.”  “  Yes,  excellent  sir.” 
I  had  been  dreaming  away  an  hour  or  more,  indolently  reclin¬ 
ing  upon  the  cushions  of  my  gondola,  amid  the  above  scene, 
after  my  return  from  my  usual  plunge  into  the  sea  on  the  far¬ 
ther  side  of  the  Cfuideca.  The  prow  of  the  gondola  soon  touch¬ 
ed  the  quay,  and  in  another  second  I  found  myself  wandering 
among  the  throng.  An  Austrian  band  was  playing  in  the 
square.  Thousands  were  promenading  on  its  smooth  and 
clean  pavements.  It  was  brilliantly  lighted.  The  cafes  and 
shops  added  greatly  to  the  illumination.  Groups  of  children, 
ladies  and  their  cavaliers,  sat  in  front  of  each  favorite  cafe, 
eating, ices,  chatting,  and  listening  to  strolling  musicians.  It 
was  a  musical  soiree  in  the  open  air  to  which  all  Venice  was 
free  to  come,  yet  none  but  well-bred  and  well-clad  people 
had  gathered  to  the  festival.  Here  they  sat  and  walked,  in 
quiet  enjoyment  of  the  clear  sky  above  and  the  enlivening 
scene  beneath,  until  late  into  the  night.  There  is  but  one  St. 
Mark’s  Place  in  the  world,  and  but  one  spectacle  of  complete 
out-door  domesticity,  refined  and  sensuous,  like  this. 

Venice  existed  as  a  state  nearly  fourteen  hundred  years. 
The  common  associations  with  her  name  are  those  derived 
through  the  poet  and  novelist.  They  are,  unfortunately,  con¬ 
nected  chiefly  with  her  vices  and  her  crimes.  We  think  of 
Venice  and  the  Bridge  of  Sighs — more  of  her  damp  dungeons 
than  her  lovely  palaces — her  tortures  than  her  festivals — her 
crimes  than  her  piety  ;  while,  as  we  glide  over  her  waters,  our 


ITALIAN  SIGHTS  AND  PAPAL  PRINCIPLES. 


371 


eyes  shudderingly  turn  from  the  bosom  of  that  canal  into  which 
no  fisherman  was  allowed  to  cast  his  net  from  fear  that  dead 
men  might  rise  and  tell  tales.  Venice  to  the  popular  mind 
was  a  vast  political  inquisition,  remorseless  as  the  grave  in 
her  state  craft,  and  in  her  private  life  full  of  selfish  luxury, 
treachery,  and  prostitution.  This  was  not  the  Venice  of  me¬ 
diaeval  ages.  Had  it  been,  the  spoiler  would  have  laid  his 
hand  upon  her  long  before.  Her  polity  was  not  a  perfect  one. 
It  generated  weaknesses.  Wealth  and  pride,  as  they  ever  do, 
cankered  her  heart.  But  for  a  thousand  years  her  bones  were 
sound,  while  for  centuries  her  strength  was  the  bulwark  of 
Christendom.  She  had  character ;  a  noble  and  vicious  com¬ 
pound,  it  is  true,  but  the  mingled  devotion  and  enterprise  that 
kept  her  for  so  long  a  period  in  the  van  of  civilization  leav¬ 
ened  her  whole  system  with  faith  and  energy. 

Catholic  herself,  she  resisted  the  Popes  as  successfully  as 
she  did  the  Turks.  Devout,  but  not  fanatic,  the  state,  and  not 
the  Church,  ruled  within  her  borders.  She  was  as  successful 
in  repelling  the  interdicts  of  the  Homan  pontiffs  as  in  check¬ 
ing  the  spread  of  Mohammedanism.  Unlike  Spain,  the  Inqui¬ 
sition  took  not  root  in  her  soil.  The  free  spirit  of  commerce 
could  ill  brook  such  a  nightmare  upon  its  energies.  Liberal 
and  just  in  her  policy,  Jew,  Greek,  and  Gentile  lived,  traffick¬ 
ed,  and  worshiped  in  security  beneath  the  shadow  of  her  lion- 
wings.  While  all  Italy  was  convulsed  with  civil  wars  and 
the  dissensions  of  rival  families,  Venice  always  presented  a 
firm  and  united  front  to  her  enemies.  Without  and  within, 
she  was  ever  a  unity.  Nobles  and  people  have  loved  Venice 
as  no  other  country  has  been  loved.  The  individual  was 
merged  into  the  nation.  From  the  time  that  the  first  settlers, 
flying  before  Alaric  to  the  mother  island  of  Tercello,  saw  in  the 
distance  the  sky  reddened  with  the  flames  of  their  late  homes 
on  the  mainland,  until  Bonaparte  deposed  their  last  doge,  the 


373 


ITALIAN  SIGHTS  AND  PAPAL  PRINCIPLES. 


Venetians  have  ever  been  animated  with  a  fanatic  love  of 
country.  Patriotism  in  them  was  a  passion,  narrowed  to  a 
selfish  policy,  which  sacrificed  citizen  or  stranger  alike  to  its 
own  end,  governed  at  times  wisely,  hut  often  misdirected,  un¬ 
til,  in  contact  with  stronger  selfishness,  it  fell  shivered  to  the 
ground  like  a  thing  of  glass. 

There  must  have  been  much  that  was  true  and  lofty  in  the 
soul  of  Venice  to  have  preserved  its  independence  during  a 
period  which  extends  far  beyond  the  existence  of  any  modern 
state.  In  the  sixteenth  century,  we  find  her  the  residence  of 
the  greatest  artists.  Emperors  and  kings,  at  a  time  when 
Francis  I.  of  France  and  Charles  I.  of  Spain  rivaled  each  other 
in  their  patronage  of  art,  and  the  Medici  corrupted  Italy  in 
lavish  expenditure  and  bastard  taste  to  the  enrichment  of  art¬ 
ists,  sought  to  win  from  Venice  her  noblest  names.  Like  San¬ 
sovino,  they  replied,  that,  having  the  happiness  to  live  under  a 
republic,  it  would  be  folly  to  change  for  a  monarchy.  Her 
patricians,  unlike  the  ignorant  nobility  of  the  rest  of  Europe, 
cultivated  literature.  Their  doges,  at  once  generals  and  ad¬ 
mirals  away  from  Venice,  on  their  return  exchanged  the  sword 
for  the  pen.  Some,  like  Andrea  Dandolo  and  Marco  Fosca- 
rini,  became  historians  ;  others,  of  the  noble  families  of  the 
Carnaro,  Justiniani,  Morosini,  Contarini,  and  Mocenigo,  were 
professors  or  simply  librarians.  All  labored  to  instruct  and 
exalt  Venice.  It  was  owing  to  the  profound  respect  shown  to 
art  and  literature  by  her  noblest  citizens,  extending  as  it  did 
to  all  classes,  that  so  many  distinguished  artists,  few  of  whom 
were  born  within  her  limits,  were  led  to  make  their  homes  on 
her  congenial  soil. 

The  cultivation  of  her  intellect  was  therefore  one  source  of 
her  long  and  refined  existence.  Among  others,  in  her  policy, 
must  not  be  overlooked  her  jealous  resistance  to  the  spiritual 
and  temporal  encroachment  of  Rome.  Her  clergy  were  sub- 


ITALIAN  SIGHTS  AND  PAPAL  PRINCIPLES. 


373 


ordinate  to  the  state.  Churchmen  were  not  only  excluded 
from  the  Grand  Council,  hut  were  declared  ineligible  to  civil 
employments.  In  1434,  even  the  relatives  of  priests  were  pro¬ 
hibited  from  the  post  of  embassador  at  Rome.  When  eccle¬ 
siastical  matters  were  discussed  in  the  national  councils,  all 
those  members  whose  votes  were  liable  to  be  influenced  by  the 
ties  of  blood  were  expelled.  Unlike  other  countries  at  that 
epoch — the  fifteenth  century — a  priest  guilty  of  infraction  of 
the  civil  law  was  amenable  to  the  police,  without  reference  to 
the  tribunals  of  the  Church.  In  1484,  a  clergyman  assaulted 
a  clothier  with  a  drawn  weapon.  He  was  taken  immediately 
and  hanged.  This  fact  shows  the  severity  and  impartiality  of 
their  law. 

To  avoid  all  pretense  of  Rome  to  intervene  in  their  political 
affairs,  the  Venetians  respected  scrupulously  her  religious  dog¬ 
mas.  They  took  no  part  in  the  heresies,  councils,  or  religious 
wars  of  the  times.  They  were  no  less  inflexible  in  preserving 
their  system  of  toleration.  By  commerce  they  lived  and  pros¬ 
pered.  No  illiberal  doctrines  were  allowed  to  check  the  pros¬ 
perity  of  trade.  All  sects  were  permitted  their  houses  of  wor¬ 
ship.  Even  burial  in  churches  was  not  refused  to  heretics. 
With  all  this  latitude,  so  unusual  at  that  age,  Venice  preserved 
her  reputation  for  the  purity  of  her  faith.  “We  Kxe  jirst  Ve¬ 
netians,  then  Christians.”  This  was  her  maxim,  indicative  of 
her  unalterable  resolution  that  no  partial  or  foreign  policy 
should  interfere  with  the  sovereignty  of  the  state. 

The  Jesuits,  in  particular,  were  objects  of  suspicion.  No 
one  of  that  order  could  remain  in  Venice  more  than  three 
years.  The  slightest  disobedience  to  the  authority  of  the 
government  was  punished  by  imprisonment.  Noble  families 
were  not  allowed  to  have  their  children  educated  at  their  col¬ 
leges.  No  Venetian  could  enter  their  order  unless  by  the 
sanction  of  the  government.  It  was  forbidden  to  will  them 


374 


ITALIAN  SIGHTS  AND  PAPAL  PRINCIPLES. 


property.  Such  were  some  of  the  jealous  safeguards  with 
which  the  state  fortified  itself  against  a  foe  as  insidious,  im¬ 
placable,  cold,  secret,  and  selfish  as  its  own  policy,  but  more 
deadly,  because  joined  to  a  hydra-headed  versatility  of  princi¬ 
ple,  which  made  its  professed  friendship  more  to  be  dreaded 
than  its  open  enmity. 

The  governing  spring  of  Venetian  policy  was  her  commer¬ 
cial  interest.  With  her  it  was  a  restricted,  purely  selfish  in¬ 
terest,  looking  only  to  her  own  aggrandizement,  at  whatever 
expense  of  blood  and  prosperity  to  other  nations.  She  did 
not  comprehend  the  wider  maxims  of  modern  civilization, 
which  see  in  general  peace  and  prosperity  the  firmest  founda¬ 
tions  for  individual  success.  On  the  contrary,  she  sought  to 
rise  on  the  ruin  rather  than  the  competition  and  consequent 
enlargement  of  the  fields  of  commerce  foreign  to  her  own 
channels  of  traffic.  She  brooked  no  rival.  Insults  to  her 
honor  might  be  overlooked,  but  peril  to  her  trade,  never.  Her 
aspiration  was  to  be  the  commercial  heart  of  the  world.  The 
policy  which  gave  her  tolerance  in  religion,  a  firm  protective 
government,  encouragement  to  art  and  science,  attracting  with¬ 
in  herself  talent,  capital,  and  enterprise,  was  wise  and  success¬ 
ful.  But,  inasmuch  as  she  resorted  to  fraud  and  violence 
without,  sacrificing  great  truths  to  special  interests,  estimating 
conquests  only  by  the  spirit  of  the  ledger,  their  justice  gradu¬ 
ated  only  by  their  facility,  Venice  in  time  corrupted  herself. 
From  being  the  prey  of  her  own  avarice  and  wantonness,  she 
passed  into  the  sordid  embraces  of  the  Northern  stranger,  who 
coveted  even  the  remains  of  a  beauty  he  could  never  hope  to 
rival.  This  was  a  legitimate  end  for  a  nation  that  trafficked 
its  piety,  exacting  from  united  Europe  the  highest  price  for  its 
aid  against  the  infidel,  and  finally  broke  faith  and  betrayed 
religion  for  selfish  gain. 

The  taint  that  pervaded  the  commercial  veins  of  Venice 


ITALIAN  SIGHTS  AND  PAPAL  PRINCIPLES. 


S/T) 


was  a  necessary  consequence  of  her  unscrupulous  devotion  to 
Mammon.  But  throughout  her  history,  especially  in  the  first 
thousand  years,  and  particularly  when  moral  worth  and  tried 
talent  were  the  choice  of  the  people  to  their  highest  offices, 
we  find  repeated  and  continued  evidences  of  individual  and 
national  nobility  of  feeling.  There  was  a  sound  current  in 
her  blood,  that  repeatedly  brought  her  back  to  healthful  action. 
If  it  could  not  save  Venice  in  the  final  turmoil  of  nations,  it 
constantly  exalted  her  career,  giving  her  power  and  might, 
glorifying  her  existence  even  amid  much  error  and  abase¬ 
ment.  Her  saving  grace  arose  from  her  piety.  P^ounded  in 
disaster,  nursed  in  warfare,  passing  rapidly  from  the  greatest 
reverses  to  the  loftiest  triumphs,  the  national  feeling  has  ever 
been  devotional.  Even  when  the  rest  of  Italy  was  far  gone 
in  infidelity,  Venice  maintained  an  external  religious  decorum, 
which  preserved  her  nationality  intact,  and  sustained  her  rep¬ 
utation  to  the  very  verge  of  her  final  fall.  National  policy 
subjected  private  piety  to  worldly  ends,  but  the  latter  gave 
strength  and  vigor  to  the  former  from  its  own  fount  of  sincer- 
ity  and  enthusiasm.  Virtue  may  often  be  misapplied,  but  its 
own  strength  of  lofty  motive  ever  remains  the  same.  Hence 
selfishness  is  never  more  powerful  and  dangerous  than  when 
it  blinds  religion  to  aid  its  designs.  Occasionally  we  find, 
from  its  inherent  strength  and  purity,  that  it  subjects  its  tyrant 
and  becomes  the  guide,  trampling  upon  temporary  expediency 
and  short-sighted  state-craft.  At  such  times  the  whole  body 
politic  becomes  inoculated  with  new  life.  The  habit  of  con¬ 
fessing  God  in  all  the  transactions  of  life,  begun  in  sincerity, 
and  continued  in  serious  and  simple  familiarity,  yeeZmg-  that 
there  is  a  “  Father  in  heaven”  whose  name  is  ever  to  be  hal¬ 
lowed  in  thought  and  action,  has  an  important  influence  upon 
human  character.  To  this  may  be  traced  much  of  the  dignity 
and  heroism  of  the  Venetian  mind,  coupled  with  serenity  and 


376 


ITALIAN  SIGHTS  AND  PAPAL  PRINCIPLES. 


energy  of  will,  even  when  unworthily  employed.  Its  fullness 
was  commensurate  with  the  greatness  of  Venice,  and  its  de¬ 
cline  with  her  gradual  and  complete  degradation,  the  more 
conspicuous  from  her  previous  nobility,  as  the  grossest  corrup¬ 
tion  proceeds  from  the  richest  soils.  The  same  sun  of  right¬ 
eousness  flowed  in  upon  her  mind,  but  it  was  no  longer  hum¬ 
ble  or  sincere  ;  instead,  there  were  festering  selfishness  and 
cankering  avarice  ;  the  heart  that  would  have  M'^armed  humil¬ 
ity  and  sincerity  into  divine  life  and  wisdom  turned  selfish¬ 
ness  and  avarice  into  putrefaction.  Religion  in  Venice  be¬ 
came  mere  formalism  more  slowly  than  elsewhere,  owing  to 
the  innate  vigor  and  Avarmth  of  the  national  mind.  At  pres¬ 
ent,  her  piety,  as  her  beauty,  is  but  the  shade  of  her  former 
self.  The  shallow  lagoons,  with  their  dull  gray  surface  and 
grassy  bottoms,  the  habitations  of  slimy  eels,  truly  reflect  the 
fallen  image  of  that  city,  whose  throne  in  ivory,  gold,  and  pre¬ 
cious  stones  shone  for  ten  centuries  over  the  Avaters  of  the 
Mediterranean,  and  whose  flag  so  often  triumphantly  upheld 
the  Cross  before  the  Crescent.  Even  the  Turks  were  not  in¬ 
sensible  to  the  nobility  of  Venetian  character  in  their  most  in¬ 
defatigable  foe.  Upon  learning  the  death  of  Luigi  Mocenigo, 
they  spontaneously  put  on  mourning,  draped  their  galleys  in 
black,  and  caused  them  to  pass  with  respectful  homage  before 
the  place  of  his  burial. 

At  Windsor  Castle  we  see  the  portraits  of  England’s  distin¬ 
guished  men  appareled  in  gaudy  cloth,  covered  with  gilt  and 
precious  stones,  the  trappings  of  poAver,  pride  of  state,  and 
haughty  self-consciousness  of  rank  legible  in  every  touch  of 
the  brush  ;  brave  men,  no  doubt,  strong  in  their  own  intel¬ 
lect,  but,  like  Nebuchadnezzar’s  image  of  gold,  set  up  to  be 
worshiped  by  the  soulless  throng.  What  have  we  in  Venice? 
We  see  her  great  men,  doges  and  generals,  pictured  in  all  the 
Autality  of  existence  by  the  pencils  of  Bellini,  Titian,  and  Tin- 


ITALIAN  SIGHTS  AND  PAPAL  PRINCIPLES. 


377 


toretto,  not  in  the  paraphernalia  of  external'power,  but  in  their 
dignified  costumes,  serious  and  devout  in  mien,  humbly  kneel¬ 
ing  before  the  images  of  their  faith,  the  divine  Mother  and 
Son,  to  whom  they  offer  their  crowns  of  success,  indicative  of 
their  trust  in  and  homage  to  that  Being  W'ho  alone  creates  and 
casts  down,  exalts  and  abases.  This  feeling  is  consistent  with 
the  devotion  of  that  doge  who  was  carried  in  his  dying  hour 
to  the  foot  of  the  altar  of  St.  Mark’s,  saying  with  his  departing 
breath,  “  Into  thy  hinds,  0  Lord,  I  commend  my  spirit  and  the 
republic.”  So  also  Lorenzo  Priuli,  elected  doge  at  a  moment 
when  his  country  was  suffering  from  the  threefold  plague  of 
war,  pestilence,  and  famine,  commenced  his  inaugural  address 
with  the  devout  ejaculation,  “  Even  though  I  walk  in  the  val¬ 
ley  of  the  shadow  of  death,  I  shall  fear  no  evil,  because  thou 
art  with  me.” 

A  prolific  source  of  greatness  to  Venice  lay  in  wise  incorpo¬ 
ration  of  other  natural  elements  of  industry  and  strength  into 
her  own  system.  She  continually  reinvigorated  her  own  blood 
by  fresh  streams  from  without.  This  was  owing  to  the  liberal 
tone  of  commerce,  which  ever  seeks  for  itself  the  best,  irre¬ 
spective  of  origin.  Consequently,  we  find  in  Venice,  espe¬ 
cially  in  architecture,  a  variety  that  tells  of  Oriental,  Byzan¬ 
tine,  Lombard,  and  Gothic  origin,  yet  fused  by  Venetian  taste 
into  one  consistent  whole,  each  style  adding  value  to  the  other. 
Over  all  the  earlier  architecture  there  is  thrown  the  spiritual 
mantle  of  religious  feeling.  Borrowing  largely  as  they  did 
from  their  Arab  enemies  their  delicate  and  graceful  architec¬ 
ture,  with  its  rich  coloring  and  prolific  ornamentation,  the  Ve¬ 
netians,  in  transforming  it  to  the  service  of  their  own  loftier 
faith,  caused  it  to  glow  with  hues  that  savored  of  celestial  glo¬ 
ries,  while  its  walls  spoke  to  them  in  adamantine  energy  of  its 
mystic  truths.  Every  where  amid  the  public  and  private  ar¬ 
chitecture  of  old  Venice  we  find  evidence  of  the  devotion  of 


378 


ITALIAN  SIGHTS  AND  PAPAL  PRINCIPLES. 


its  citizens.  They  were  not  ashamed  to  confess  their  God 
equally  in  their  bed-chambers  and  their  council-halls.  Their 
continual  going  down  to  the  sea  in  ships  and  incessant  con¬ 
flicts  with  infidel  foes,  and  having  their  homes,  as  they  did, 
upon  the  restless  ocean,  kept  alive  within  them  a  constant  and 
sincere  recognition  of  Him  who  holds  the  elements  in  the  hol¬ 
low  of  his  hand,  and  controls  the  destinies  of  nations  by  the 
breath  of  His  will.  Hence  their  devout  and  serious  character. 
They  gloried  not  so  much  in  their  own  strength  as  in  divine 
protection.  Nature  had  warmed  their  skies  with  the  most 
glorious  of  her  hues.  Commerce  had  made  them  familiar 
with  the  brilliant  tints  of  the  Orient.  Pearls  and  precious 
stones,  and  all  the  rich  stuffs  of  Arabian  manufacture,  Avere 
gathered  into  her  bosom  for  profit  and  adornment.  From  the 
West  and  the  North  there  poured  into  her  canals  a  continuous 
throng  of  commercial  pilgrims  or  crusading  heroes.  Her  con¬ 
quests  were  marked  by  a  rapacity  inoculated  by  the  spirit  of 
trade.  Wealth  and  monopoly  were  her  axioms  ;  enterprise, 
cunning,  and  force,  her  agents  ;  at  times,  high  principles  and 
pure  aspirations  directed  her  councils  ;  at  others,  selfish  max¬ 
ims  and  short-sighted  policy  ;  but  her  progress  for  ten  centu¬ 
ries,  in  harvesting  to  herself  the  riches  of  the  earth,  gathering 
within  her  narrow  limits  the  tastes,  civilization,  and  knowl¬ 
edge  of  all  nations,  making  a  highway  of  the  ocean,  centring 
all  roads  into  her  own  lagoons,  was  steadily  onward.  Palace- 
built  Venice,  with  her  jeweled  shrines,  wave-washed  walls  of 
porphyry  and  jasper,  her  mystic  sculpture  and  allegorical  mo¬ 
saics,  imbued  with  thought,  and  burning  with  the  colors  of  rev¬ 
elation,  her  lone,  lofty  watch-tower,  and  her  myriad  of  heaven- 
directed  spires,  her  marble-checkered  pavements,  and  her  half 
Western  and  half  Oriental  homes,  combining  the  energy  of  the 
one  quarter  with  the  sensuous  and  jealous  life  of  the  other,  all 
beautiful  and  bright,  like  a  sea-born  pearl — such  was  the  Ven- 


ITALIAN  SIGHTS  AND  PAPAL  PRINCIPLES. 


379 


ice  that  grew  up  amid  the  mud  and  shallows  of  the  Adriatic. 
So  long  as  she  held  to  her  devotional  energy,  expanding  her 
thought  with  her  fields  of  enterprise,  she  shone  forth  on  the 
waters  their  queen,  splendid  and  prosperous.  But  when,  in 
a  fatal  hour,  she  adopted  the  renaissant  paganism  of  Italy, 
the  vitality  of  her  faith  and  the  life  of  her  action  departed. 
Enervated  by  luxury,  corrupted  by  vice,  commerce  sought  new 
channels.  Gleams  of  former  virtue  occasionally  illumined  her 
dark  horizon,  but  her  brightness  and  her  beauty  no  longer 
shone  with  a  pure  flame,  and  she  became  a  glittering  corpse. 

The  renaissance  had  much  to  do  with  this — not  so  much  as 
the  active  agent,  as  the  exposition  of  a  changed  heart.  Archi¬ 
tecture  is  among  all  nations  the  exponent  of  its  inner  thought, 
We  can  read  the  ruling  ideas  in  its  form  and  ornament.  Every 
curve  and  color  can  be  made  to  tell  the  feeling  of  a  people, 
whether  cold  or  passionate,  pure  or  base,  serene  or  false,  relig¬ 
ious  or  sensual,  with  all  their  gradations  from  nobility  to  mean¬ 
ness.  The  youth  of  Venice  was  passed  in  prayer  and  tribula¬ 
tion.  Her  earlier  architecture  was  simple,  sincere,  and  sym¬ 
bolical.  Inherited  from  Christian  Rome,  it  partook  of  its  se¬ 
verely  graceful  and  classical  forms  ;  the  noble  arch  and  rich 
capital ;  in  which  Lombard  energy,  with  its  rude  and  vigorous 
imagination,  wrote  its  homely  and  mystic  thoughts,  symbolical 
of  northern  life  and  freedom.  From  this  element  sprang  hardi¬ 
hood  and  enterprise  ;  vigor  in  war,  sincerity  in  worship,  and 
commercial  activity  in  peace.  It  embodied  religious  dogmas 
into  material  forms,  tending  in  the  common  mind  to  substitute 
the  worship  of  the  thing  created  for  the  Creator.  To  coun¬ 
teract  the  idolatrous  tendency  of  imaginative  worship  founded 
upon  the  creature  was  the  mission  of  the  Arab,  who,  rolling 
like  a  lava-stream  from  the  hot  South  upon  the  decaying  frag¬ 
ments  of  Roman  civilization,  proclaimed  with  ferocious  energy 
the  unity  and  spirituality  of  a  new  creed.  That  which  he 


380 


ITALIAN  SIGHTS  AND  PAPAL  PRINCIPLES, 


could  not  warm  into  a  new  life,  he  consumed.  No  other  cry 
to  heaven  was  allowed  where  his  sword  flashed  but  that 
which  from  his  minarets  told  “  There  is  no  s;od  but  God.” 
This  element,  to  the  extent  of  its  eivilization,  but  not  of  its  faith, 
found  a  home  at  Venice,  and  mingled  its  grace  and  beauty 
with  Gothic  fancies  and  energy.  Thus  we  have  the  dome  and 
minaret,  arabesque  and  grotesque,  the  profuse  imagery  of  Eu¬ 
rope  and  the  brilliant  colorings  of  Asia,  all  united  into  a  mixed 
and  not  pleasing  architecture  at  Venice,  the  central  point 
around  which  revolved  the  two  great  conflicting  principles  of 
religion. 

The  decadence  of  Venice  became  rapid  from  the  period 
when  she  abandoned  those  styles  of  architecture  which  sprang 
from  faith  and  were  the  oflspring  of  devotional  feeling  dedi¬ 
cating  its  riches  to  the  service  of  the  sanctuary,  for  self-glori¬ 
fication  and  enervating  ease.  The  Renaissance  was  the  off¬ 
spring  of  modern  infidelity.  In  proportion  as  Venice  had  been 
pure  in  her  faith,  in  that  degree  she  became  corrupt  in  her 
idolatry.  True,  she  did  not  go  back  to  pagan  mythology  for 
objects  of  worship.  She  did  worse.  Her  idols  became  wholly 
of  sense,  the  external  glorification  of  her  own  weakened  power, 
and  the  sensual  expression  of  her  own  vitiated  tastes.  Better 
by  far  had  she  worshiped  the  intellectual  creatures  of  classical 
ages,  exalting  humanity  by  elevating  its  types.  But  no.  She 
preferred  the  orgies  of  worldly  pleasure  to  the  excitements  of 
mental  pursuits.  The  pride  of  power  and  luxury  of  life,  amal¬ 
gamated  into  a  sensualized  existence,  betraying  themselves  in 
cold  mansions,  stately  and  selfish,  emblazoned  with  insignia  of 
state-rank  or  individual  pride,  and  ornamented  with  incon¬ 
gruous  classicalism,  now  drove  humility  and  belief  in  spirit¬ 
ualities  into  exile  from  their  once  cherished  homes.  The  lech¬ 
erous  and  beastly  decorations  derived  from  corrupted  pagan 
imaginations  became  the  rule  for  Christian  architecture.  All 


ITALIAN  SIGHTS  AND  PAPAL  PRINCIPLES. 


381 


that  was  pure  and  good  in  spirit  in  classical  architecture  was 
carefully  sifted  and  set  aside.  All  that  was  impure  and  bad 
was  extracted,  and  still  farther  tainted  by  the  foul  fancies  of 
the  sensualized  imafjinations  of  modern  art.  Hence,  althouf^h 
some  grace  of  design,  convenience,  and  adaptation  to  physical 
comfort  may  be  allowed  to  the  bastard  architecture  of  modern 
Venice,  yet  its  spirit  is  wholly  of  the  earth,  earthy.  It  rooted 
itself  in  her  decline,  and  is  symbolical  of  the  vices  that  hasten¬ 
ed  her  fall 

In  viewing  Venice,  therefore,  the  traveler  should  carefully 
distinguish  between  the  several  styles  of  her  architecture  as 
illustrative  of  her  ruling  principles  in  the  different  epochs  of 
her  existence.  As  plainly  as  character  is  typified  in  human 
features,  as  legibly  are  the  virtues  and  vices  of  nations  to  be 
read  in  their  architecture.  Back  amid  sea-weed,  choked  ca¬ 
nals,  silent  and  deserted,  the  time-stained  shutters  half  drop¬ 
ping  from  time,  rust-eaten  hinges,  with  basements  water- 
stained  and  foundations  cracked  and  broken,  the  sea  each  tide 
oozing  lazily  in  and  out  their  stones,  do  we  find  many  man¬ 
sions  before  which  it  will  do  us  more  good  to  pause  than  be¬ 
fore  the  stately  piles  of  Palladio  and  less  worthy  architects, 
who  have  usurped  the  sites  of  so  many  of  the  older  and  purer 
palaces  on  the  principal  canals.  In  their  obscurity,  deserted 
and  poverty-struck,  they  are  perishing  piecemeal  ;  but  on 
their  venerable  fronts  are  still  to  be  seen  the  records  of  the 
feeling  in  which  they  were  built.  Symbols  of  Christian  faith, 
the  noble  abstraction  of  its  pure  tenets,  each  in  its  day  “  a 
word  in  season”  to  the  indweller  and  passer-by. 

For  ornament  we  see  pure  and  simple  forms  of  nature,  elab¬ 
orately  wrought  or  rudely  carved,  amid  masses  of  richly-col¬ 
ored  stones,  each  suggestive  of  life  and  beauty,  and  leading  the 
thought  to  the  nobler  forms  and  hues  of  God’s  own  works. 
Pause  well  before  such  buildings.  There  is  a  moral  written 


382 


ITALIAN  SIGHTS  AND  PAPAL  PRINCIPLES. 


on  their  fronts  that  modernism,  in  its  dainty  devices  and  pue^ 
rile  fancies,  its  science-worship  and  ease-coveting,  is  in  dan¬ 
ger  of  forgetting.  We  whiten  our  sepulchres,  and  forget  the 
dead  men’s  hones  within.  So  long  as  we  keep  our  soul  unde¬ 
filed,  the  intellect  active  and  sincere,  loving  beauty  as  the  gift 
of  its  author,  and  not  debasing  it  to  administer  to  selfish  and 
sensual  desires,  just  so  long  need  we  take  no  heed  to  outer  ex¬ 
pression.  That  will  reflect  the  harmony  and  truth  that  reigns 
within.  But  if  we  seek  to  disguise  our  own  falsities  by  ex¬ 
ternal  show,  we  shall  as  plainly  expose  the  concupiscence  that 
burns  within,  as  did  Venice,  when  in  her  pride  and  infidelity 
she  practically  denied  the  living  principles  that  had  raised  her 
to  power  and  dominion. 


THE  END. 


V 


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